


The Head and the Heart

by DayDreamingAni



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: A/B/G/O Dynamics, Alpha!Bucky, Alpha!Steve, Alpha!Thor, Alpha!Tony, Alpha/Omega pairing, Angst with a Happy Ending, Beta!Natasha, Beta!Pepper Potts, Beta!Sam, F/M, Gamma!Bruce, Gamma!Clint, Mixing Normal human issues with Hero Life, Multi, Pack Buildings, Pack Dynamics, Pack Family, Pack Feels
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-09-13
Updated: 2018-08-14
Packaged: 2018-08-14 19:17:45
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 16
Words: 38,189
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8025820
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DayDreamingAni/pseuds/DayDreamingAni
Summary: A/B/G/O The Principle Dynamics:The Alphas make up the Head.The Betas are the Neck which support and uphold the Alpha's Head.The Gammas are easily the body who obey the Head and protect thy Neck.Omegas...Omegas, she doesn't rightly now what an Omega should or could present. Only that they aren't represented and are often pushed aside as unwanted oddities that disrupt the order of the Dynamic. ORThe one in which an Omega falls for an Alpha or Two and is forced to deal with a hell of a lot more than simple Biological responses and how the world thinks she should live her life. ORThe one in which we have an OFC!Omega, an Alpha!Captain America and a Renegade Alpha!Bucky and I've forced them all into a relationship because I very well, fucking, can. (I'm trying real hard to keep this from being a non-original Alpha's rescue the damsel in distress Omega troupe. But, I've never written a A/B/G/O Fic before and I might just let my inner die hard romantic fangirl out to run the show.)





	1. Intro to Principle Dynamics

**Author's Note:**

> Α 23% β 17% Γ 57% Ω 3%

* * *

 

 

They don't know why the Titles exist still. After all, the human race has long since been removed from their more animal instincts. They walk upright now and have built whole civilizations from mud and stone. Still, the Titles and Positions exist and none of the scientists—with all their fancy titles and degrees—can explain why they remain. But, they sure have written endlessly about it.

Papers upon papers of nonsense drawing, with a stark outline, each role of a Position or Title. All of it so eloquently dubbed The Principle Dynamics by some Greek philosopher back in the toga wearing days. Back then the roles had been more rigid and less expansive. They have long since been altered, edited and revamped. But, for the most part, they are utterly the same.

The Principle Dynamics goes as follows:

First and foremost are the Alphas, those who rule, those who lead, those that stand above and before all Dynamics. They make for the beginning and the only.

Alphas are the Head.

Their words are law. They make up for 23% of the worlds population. They are often seen in positions of power, such as: military, police, owners of companies or any head positions. Such prowess cannot be squandered. Alphas, both female and male, are always virile and fertile people. An Alpha Bonded or not—even if to a Gamma—will almost surely yield a healthy brood. Their ability to mate and breed outside of a bond belongs only to them as does their draw-back of going into a rut every so often during a year.

Second are always the Betas, fiercely loyal, the staunch defenders, and determined enforcers.

Betas are the Neck who support the Head at all costs.

They rank second in the Dynamics and make up 17% of the Whole. They too have often taken such roles as their leaders. For under their calming scents and determined resolves, sits strength only ever beaten by an Alpha's. This is why, when Alphas—rare in their own right—are missing Betas are welcome to govern or oversee lower Dynamics. If properly Bonded(Mated), a Beta can certainly produce children, though often not as easily as an Alpha might. It is not unheard, even, of a Beta and Gamma mating to be found successful. (A Beta is encouraged to mate with those of his Title, but, not forced to do so.) A rut for a Beta is rare. An adult Beta can go their whole lives with only ever experiencing eight.

Third come the Gammas, these are who make up most of the whole of the Dynamics.

Gammas make up the body who do only as the Head and Neck allow.

They are the workforce, what makes the Whole of Dynamics function well rather than fall apart at the seams. They make up 57% of the worlds populace, easily the most dominate role, despite not exhibiting any real dominate behavior. Gammas, despite laws in their favor, are hardly ever elevated to positions with much power. They are often found in positions of caretakers, but, can also be found in active war grounds. Gammas, though they stand as the pillars of society, receive the short end of the breeding sticks. For a Gamma is notoriously known to be lacking in sexual drive and almost all are plagued with an inability to produce even one child. If a Gamma wishes to mate—in an effort to procreate—it is wiser to seek out a Beta—or better yet—an Alpha for such purposes. If not, a dual Gamma pairing, is often found to be an infertile union. (Gammas are encouraged to mate outside of their Title, for the betterment of the whole, but not forced to do so.) Bonds, between dual Gamma pairings, are unlike an Alphas or a Betas as they do not accurately have a hold an Alphas or a Betas Mark may bear. Gammas are never susceptible to Ruts, though. (Their biology never ruling their bodies as often it may for an Alpha or a Beta.)

Last are those who come in on the lowest position in the order of the Principle Dynamics: Omegas.

Omegas...Omegas don't have positions. Not really, for they are oddities and unexplainable in the paradigm of the Functioning Principle Dynamics. So she's not entirely sure what to liken Omegas to.

There are no set positions for them because, despite the active petitioning, there is ever only one position thought best for them: Breeding. Omegas may come in last and may be so rare that they hardly make any real impact on the Whole, but, they are the most fertile. In fact, they are among the only who can yield a successful pairing with no matter of the opposing Title. But, they are docile Title Bearers. (They are often found lacking in many aspects and so are restricted to domesticated positions, as in: housework, nurturing care giving or child rearing positions their only true option.) Their fertility, like that of an Alphas, comes with it's own draw backs. Instead of a Rut, what they gain as their many burdens is a Heat, for an un-Bonded Omega to go through a Heat is to suffer in the highest forms. This is why, by the decree of the Principle Dynamics, an Omega is to be bonded by an available Alpha/Beta or even a compatible Gamma as soon as they present. (Choice in the matter is so rarely offered to an Omega over such a thing.) There are more Laws forbidding an Omega to a normal life than there is to any other Title in the Dynamic. But, this is easily overlooked, as Omegas make up only 3% of the Whole and it is painfully easy to over look them.

These are the Principle Dynamics adopted by most cultures as to what is socially acceptable.

In this day and age, an Alpha title is what you dream about—the Perfect Role to strive for. A Beta role is just below Awesome—but the Second best is better than nothing. Gamma life is often what is accepted as the norm but still better than the last option.

Omega life is something all roles, Alpha/Beta/Gamma, agree is a sentence worse than death.

And she, she has the incredibly horrid dastardly bad luck, to have been born in that lowly title and 3—goddamn fucking—percent.

This is the story of how a lowly Omega like herself winds up living among the pedigree of all Title Bearers despite what she may be. This is the story of how she finds a pack among such unlikely people. This is the story of how she broke a few hearts while trying to mend hers. This is the story of how she, such a simple girl, managed to wrangle herself Love when locked up in a tower full of heroes.

 

* * *

 


	2. She Remembers....

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “You're a fucking Omega.”

* * *

 

 

 

With the clarity as if it has just happened to her the day before, she remembers vividly the day of her Presenting.

She remembers the pain; the unbearable, god awful, mind numbing pain that made her vomit on and on despite not having eaten in near days. She remembers the throbbing in her lower abdomen that was something like cramps, only, worse. She remembers the fever that felt like she was being cooked, broiled, alive. She remembers the way her skin itched and burned and the fire that licked its way up her veins. She remembers the faint smell that suddenly began to fill the room the more she perspired while tossing and turning.

She remembers the way her mother had stumbled in, drunk and bleary eyed, and had stopped dead in her doorway. She remembers the way her mother had clenched her jaw and glared at her with such intensity she could've killed her with that look alone.

She remembers her mothers tight lipped order to quiet her moans and groans of pain. She remembers how frantic her mother had been to seal the room. The windows all nailed shut and heavy blankets tapped over them. She remembers how her mother had run to the other room and brought back a hand full of herbs tossed in a bowl. She remembers the hideous scent of them being burned in an effort to mask her growing scent.

“You're an Omega,” her mother had gruffly and angrily growled through grit teeth. Her eyes are hard and heart breakingly cold as she stares down at her from where she sits. There's a bottle of whiskey in her hands being tightly gripped and diligently emptied, “You're a fucking _Omega_.”

The way her mother had slurred the word had made her feel like she was dirty. It made her feel like she should fix it—herself—and stop this from being true. Or better yet, it had made her feel like she should ask for forgiveness. She remembers the shame and guilt that pools in her chest and the pools of tears that threaten to tumble over.

“You're a fucking Omega, do you know what that means?” her mother demanded of her. Her dark curling locks swaying with her anger. Dark eyes—eyes like her own—narrow as she spits out, “You couldn't be a Beta or a fucking Gamma? Why the fuck did you have to be a goddamn Omega?!”

She remembers the way something in her, something that had always defended her mothers against the rumors and talk of her drunken escapades, snap. She remembers the way her heart constricts in her chest and makes it so its so very hard to breath. She remembers the way a shuddering sob slips past her lips. She remembers how her mother had recoiled from the sound as if physically repulsed by it.

“Don't you fucking cry. Just cause you're an Omega doesn't mean you have to act like a simpering bitch. Get your shit together and quick because it won't take long for the whole fucking barrio to catch the scent of a bitch in heat,” her mother had spit out before exiting without a backward glance.

She remembers the boiling heat of the tears that carved their way down her cheeks. She remembers how her throat had ached and throbbed with the effort it had taken to stifle every sob. She remembers throwing more matches at the herbs in the bowl. She remembers burning the sheets too and bathing in that scent. She remembers how it had taken her a full of thirty minutes to _get her shit together_.

She remembers the feel of her mothers gaze when she exited her room feeling like, for the first time, she wasn't safe in her home. She remembers the startling epiphany that winded her at the realization that she wasn't safe anywhere. Because she's an Omega and that meant she had no say in anything. Any Alpha, Beta or even a forceful Gamma, could come up to her and claim her. She remembers the heavy weight of such knowledge hanging dead in her mothers gaze.

She remembers the scent blockers that are shoved into her hands. She remembers the knowing gaze of an old man—a bonded Beta—when he comes later that night, a syringe in hand. He was an old back alley doctor from Mexico who got paid well to keep his secrecy. She remembers him telling her that it would be easier for her to endure the Heats naturally until she is bonded. She remembers the old man trying to convince his mother—an Alpha—that it was best she find a suitable bond mate now while her daughter was so young. She remembers the scent of blood from where her mother had clocked him on the nose and effectively broken it. she remembers the feral growls that ripped from her mothers throat that night as she dragged the man out of their home by his sandaled foot. 

She remembers the lies, the scent blockers, the heat stopping serums, the drugs and the alcohol used to keep anyone from knowing the truth. She remembers her mothers words ringing in her head until long after her mother as passed and she is left to carry out such deeds on her own.

_'Never let them know. They'll take you and you won't have a say over what is done to you. They could bend you over, Bond you and never allow you out into the light of day just because they can. It is better to suffer under the drugs than it is to be taken, dominated and subjected to anothers will. They'll make you into nothing more than a breeder. opening your legs for them and squeezing out kids until you're too old or you die. Never, ever, let them know. An Omega has no rights and no one cares if you wind up dead in a ditch because you denied an Alpha. Everyone will think you deserve whatever bastard lays his hands on you. They'll tell you, you should feel lucky that someone claimed you. That you should take it because that's what you're purpose in life. Fuck that and fuck them, you want a life? You go out there and get it, but don't ever let them know what you really are. You're safer if no one knows.' You're safer if everyone thinks you're a Beta or a Gamma with a bad streak.'  
_

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thoughts?


	3. Mother knows best

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A killer smile, arms thick and wide, dark hair and hazel eyes that spoke of nothing but trouble

 

* * *

 

 

In hindsight, her mother had been right. But, then, her mother had so rarely ever been wrong.

She had just turned eighteen when she'd met him. A killer smile, arms thick and wide, dark hair and hazel eyes that spoke of nothing but trouble. He'd been an Alpha and she was living pretty fast and hard that she hadn't cared

But for the first half of their relationship, he hadn't known what she was, not really. He was under the impression that she was a Gamma. And for the most part, she'd done nothing to discourage the thought. In fact, she made a point to only ever buy products targeted for Gamma consumption. Her scent blockers and Gamma beauty products helped perpetuate the lie. He thought she was a Gamma with the fire of a Dominate Beta and he'd thought it was cute.

Between them both, there wasn't a law they hadn't broken. They'd easily fallen—quite happily if she might add—into each others downward spiral. From boosting cars to snorting questionable substance, they were you're regular Bonnie and Clyde without the whole murdering people bit.

Everything had been good then. She'd just lost her mother, her home and any remnants of who she used to be. But, she'd found a place at His side. She'd found safety and security amid the dark shadows of the home they cobbled together. She'd found happiness upon the dirty cash acquired by less than honest means.

And so, of course, she'd fallen in love.

And love...love can make people do some truly stupid things.

She'd told him, of course, bared her heart and soul for him to rifle his fingers through. Told him all the things she'd hidden from just about everyone who ever knew her. She showed him the track marks on her arm and told him the truth. The truth that she wasn't some junky shooting up heroin whenever he fell asleep on their ratty little mattress. The truth that she'd only gone into such a shady lifestyle because she needed the money to by the black market Heat suppressors. She'd told him that she wasn't a Gamma with a Beta complex.

She'd told him she was an Omega and had been all her life.

And he...he'd told her, he loved her and for a while—maybe—that was true.

But her mother had been right about what people would do once they found out. It took all of four months for his smiles to become something stretched and pained. It took all of five months for him to convince—demand—that she stop using Heat suppressors. It took all of five and a half for her to learn what happens when an Alpha's command is ignored or willfully broken.

It had taken seven months for him to force a Mark on her neck for all to see. It had taken him nine in a half months to parade her around the old neighborhood like a show pony. The marks on her face, the purpling rings of fingerprints around her arms, ignored in favor of the fact that an Alpha had rightfully snagged himself a promising Omega. That nature was taken its due course.

And her mother had been right, no one cared. They didn't care about the noises that fell out of their house. They didn't care when she walked out with broken ribs or fingers. They didn't care because she was an Omega and what purpose did they have if not to suffer the rolling hormonal tides of an entitled Alpha. No one cared, but they sure as hell gave her pitying looks and if kids ever got too close to her parents pulled them away.

So in the end, her mother had been right, though she'd never know to what extent.

 

* * *

 

 


	4. It's bullshit, for the most part....

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A type set that says Omegas as supposed to Talk, Walk and Act a certain way.

 

* * *

 

So there's this type set dilemma. The kind of which everyone likes to think completely makes up Dynamics and colors them to the T. The kind that likes to think Alphas—all Alphas Male or Female—are built a certain way. (I.E. muscle bound and athletically inclined.)The kind that like to imagine that Betas—Female or Male—are also built a certain way. (I.E. slightly watered down version of an Alpha.) The kind that think Gammas—Male or Female—are, too, structured in a certain manner. (I.E. a weaker version of a Beta and never as thickly built as Alphas would be.) the kind that say Omegas, especially, are born in a certain form.

A type set that says Alphas are supposed to Talk, Walk and Act a certain way.

A type set that says Betas are supposed to Talk, Walk and Act a certain way.

A type set that says Gammas are supposed to Talk, Walk and Act a certain way.

A type set that says Omegas as supposed to Talk, Walk and Act a certain way.

For the most part, it's a load of bullshit. Just more Classicist trash spewed by traditionalist hell bent on keeping the order nice and fucked. But it's garbage that was spewed since the 18th century. Back when girls were forced to wear petticoats and couldn't vote. Back when same sex and mixed lower Dynamics were considered illegal acts.

It's bullshit, for the most part, but more often than not people often buy into it.

So, one can hardly blame her mother for forcing her to do all that she does. Her mother helps her walk talk and act like an Alpha. Shows her how to fight that ingrained primal instinct to bow her head when an Alpha Voice is heard. Her mother shows her how to lock eyes with a challenger when all she wants to do is bare her neck. These are things her mother teaches her to scramble an on looker—or Sniffer—from seeing past the confrontational behavioral tells.

Everything else she picks up on her own.

The baring of teeth, the growls, and the challenging rumbles. These are things she learns through her own set of trials and errors. Most of them learned under the oppressive—but most effective—fists of pain.

By the time she gets out from under that horrid Bond, she can kick, punch, bite and fight like a Rutting Alpha. By the time she makes it out of the state, she's carrying herself like a Dominate Beta. By the time she makes it a little past the Bible Belt, she's smelling and looking like a Gamma with a mean streak. By the time she rolls into New York, off a rickety old bus with only twenty bucks to her name, no one could ever pin her as an Omega.

 

* * *

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the short little updates. But I'm posting this as it comes. I'm not going to sit here and let my over analytical brain hack it into pieces.


	5. Self Sufficient

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> She's not a stranger to unfair fights. She's fought many and lost about half, but she won't go down without a goddamn fight.

 

* * *

 

 

She's not proud of a lot of the things she's done in her life. In fact, if ever pressed about her past, she has a bad habit of clamming up. (No lies, no smooth deflection, just straight up locking up and looking like a deer caught in the head lights.) When she finally makes it over the G.W. Bridge she's on her last twenty dollar bill with no real concrete plans.

The first night she spends it on a park bench until a park ranger tells her to get up and get out before she's taken in.

The second night she spends on the steps of some abandoned building. She almost gets shanked by a druggie male Gamma claiming she's stepping on his territory.

By the third night she's starving and her moneys gone.

On the fifth night she finds herself bent over a car trunk and doing exactly what her mother said would wind up happening to her. She ignores the words, the heavy panting and the fingers that dig into her waist. She ignores it for the hundred dollar bill he slaps into her hand.

By the third month she's learned why people both love and hate this place. They love it because it's a big mixing bowl. Everything and Everyone is tossed in and stirred until it creates something as unique and once in a lifetime as this place is. They love it because down every street there's a sense of culture. A sense of walking through eras simply by crossing the street. And they hate it because of the exact same reasons. They hate it because everyone and everything is living right on top of each other. They hate it because those cultured streets are hostile in their own rights; unwelcoming of outsiders. They hate it because everything's too old and on the verge of decay.

By the fifth month, holed up in some rat infested hotel, she's found a place where she doesn't have to put much effort to hide what she is.

Here no one leans in to scent her if ever stopped to converse with her. No one ever tries to force her into submission if she doesn't yield enough courtesy space to a Dominate Alpha or Beta.

No, because this is New York. No one ever stops long enough to even look each other in the eye at a cross walk. No one cares about Dominate Alpha's or Betas receiving their space 'cause there's hardly any space for anyone. Everyone's too wrapped up in their own lives to worry about the Gamma smelling hooker who walks like she's a DomBeta.

No one really cares.

And for the first time in her short life she's fucking grateful.

—X—

It's an ugly little place. A hole in the wall that's likely to be run by drug money more than anything else. It's located down a long alleyway situated between two abandoned buildings. The floor is littered with all manner of trash, discarded needles, and drugged out homeless folk. She does her best to politely avoid those trying to huddle against the night cold, because, it wasn't too long ago that she was doing as they were. The further she goes down this way the darker it seems to get, for the street light doesn't bleed this far in.

Warily she casts her eyes about, searching. Her friend had said this was where the bar was located but so far she hadn't seen much party life anywhere. She was starting to suspect her friend, who already had a few marbles knocked loose in her head, was pulling a little joke on her. There are no bikes out that might signal a hidden bikers nest somewhere. No insidious skull prints anywhere or even a broken neon sign to say where this mystery bar might be at. Somewhere back she thought she saw a plaque but she didn't get close enough to read what it might have said. But, she continues her slow trek further in.

After all, she's come this far and what has she to lose?

And then, like a bomb of simple noise and loud laughter, the sound of a tall tale party unleashes onto the otherwise silent alleyway. Stilling in her steps she chances a glance back and notices the people clambering in and out of a large door suddenly pulled open. She waits long enough for the people to file in and the door to click shut before she starts moving towards it.

When she's standing before the generically dirty and unassuming door she glances to the right of it and stares at the off gold plaque at it's side. The words clear now that she stands so close, _'Sister Margaret's Home for Wayward Girls'_. Yeah, she's sure now, her friend was laughing at her somewhere.

Gripping the doorknob, she braces herself—tosses her shoulders back, lifts her head in defiance and clamps down on the unease growing in the pit of her belly so that it might not give way to her scent—and opens the door.

Despite the name, this is clearly a bar and one so very not in the up and up. There's about forty people inside, give or take a few heads, and all of them so overwhelmingly dominate it makes her primal instincts cringe back. The heavy, nearly oppressing, scent of Alpha's, Beta's and a few Gamma's sits heavy over the scent of spilled beer and dirty floors. She ignores the millions years of genetic behavior to tuck down her head and avoid all eye contact. She ignores the need to bare her neck and avoid slighting anyone lest they feel challenged.

She ignores it all the while walking with every bit of hard won confidence she has. She's not a stranger to unfair fights. She's fought many and lost about half, but she won't go down without a goddamn fight. When she gets to the bar she takes a chance to allow her dark eyes to roam the room. Cataloging every possible exit. So far she counts only the entrance.

“Uhhh, can I help you? You seem a little... _little_ to be in here,” a voice suddenly breaks the low murmur filled silence of the entirety of the place.

Quickly her eyes flash over to the man whose suddenly appeared behind the counter. First and foremost what she see's is the makings of a very worn down yellow cardigan. Second is the untamed curly strawberry blonde hair that have an appearance of a downy cloud. Third are the thick rimmed glasses and the quizzical expression on a soft featured face. His scent comes last, a soft little flutter of something like vanilla and lilac—comforting scents. Though there is, hidden beneath that, a certain tang of metal that might like defiance in him. He might be a Gamma or a Beta—she isn't too sure, one can never trust first sniffs—but he was definitely no Alpha. There's a softness to his aura that seems out of place in a dive bar such as this and would never belong to any Alpha male.

But then, he could easily be hiding his nature just as she is. She makes sure to level him with a firm gaze, unflinching and unwavering, as she slides up onto one of the bar stools.

“Look, kid,” he starts again, his eyes nervously taking in her young looking features and then warily casting his gaze over the angry crowd, “I think you better head on out, this isn't the place someone like you ought to be.”

“Someone like me?” she bites, unable to keep her flaring anger in place. He may not know what she truly was, but, goddam did her sensitive self-esteem prickle beneath her skin.

Running a hand over the back of his neck, the yellow cardigan wearing bartender, leans in slowly and lets his eyes level hers, “My patrons here, they aren't your run of the mill late night drinkers, if you catch my drift. So I'd suggest for your own safety, you get up calmly and walk out.”

“Darla sent me,” she finds herself telling him, his eyes widening before narrowing slightly at the mention of the old hooker, realization dawns behind his thick lenses before he nods his head slowly. He's linked it up in his head, what she does for a living, and why she would know Darla a fifty five year old street walker.

“I told her I was hiring,” he mumbles, before glancing around the room quickly again, “But trust me when I say this Kid, this is not the kind of place you want to work.”

With a quirk of her brow she says to him, “I'm tougher than I look.”

“Honestly?” he asks her, though does not wait for her nod or answer as he plows through with a harried strained tone, “I doubt that. You're jail bait, sweetheart. You can show up pierced and dripping in teenage 'I hate the world' angst but, you're what? A hundred pounds soaking wet? You wouldn't last a single night. So, uh, no disrespect—but you're out of your depth on this one.”

Frowning she half growls and half bites, “I can handle myself just fine and I'm twenty two years old—hardly jail bait.”

“My point still stands kid, you can't possibly understand the kind of trouble this place really is,” the honey haired man says with a furrow to his brows and a sternness to his jaw. His slight downward pointed shoulders straighten, as if, he's trying to look more imposing. His words slowly cementing themselves in his brain.

Contrary to popular belief, she's not an exact idiot. Sure, she's never finished high school—dropped out her Ninth grade year because she presented and didn't need to get labeled—and she hasn't ever understood most of what she's trying to educate herself with. But, she's not a total fucking moron. She knows where she's not wanted. She knows the man before—probably a Beta, maybe, by the tone of his voice and the sharp metal tang in his scent—is trying to do her a solid even if he's ripping up the only hope she has of finally getting off the streets.

To him, she's just some lost kid—a hooker—who's getting too deep into a world she might not survive. She can see in his brown eyes, the genuine want to help. The desperate ring to his scent as he all but takes her shoulder and shoves her out the door. Something like concern laces his face every time he glances around the room checking to see if people have noticed her yet.

And just then, she has him figured out, he's a Gamma if ever there was one. He's all care and concern—honest and giving—even when he's trying not to be. Gamma's always had a distinct need to do what was best for the Whole. Whether that meant bowing, baring necks or squaring their shoulders for a fight they most definitely _would_ lose. She silently decides, she likes the man even if he was doing his utmost best to get rid of her.

But, no sooner do the bartenders words leave his mouth does she feel a hand winding it's way over her waist to settle on her hip. Turning to her left she takes in the crooked toothed smile of a man well past his prime. By the scent of him, hidden deep under the stale beer and rancid stench of filth, he's a Beta—a Dominate one at that. There's a glint in his gaze as he sneers down his nose at her. A vicious slide of pheromones that lets her know he's interested in more than just sharing a few drinks.

“What's a pretty little thing like you doing in a place like this?” the stranger asks, his sour breath fanning over one side of her face and making her empty belly twist.

“ _Leaving_!” the bartender announces, his voice a bit frantic and higher pitched than his usual speaking tone, “She was just _leaving_ , right kid?”

The not so subtle hint the bartender sends her makes the tips of her frowning lips quirk up in a rueful smile. It'd been a long while since anyone had ever shown concern about the fact that man—definitively older than her by a few decades and clearly ill intended—was slobbering over her. Most nights, people made it a painfully conscious act to ignore such actions. But clearly, the Gamma bartender with the soft honey hair doesn't want her getting caught up in this brand of trouble.

So fighting her self engrained need to never back away from a challenge, she nods her head at the bartender. Saying as she does do, “Well, thanks, then.”

The honey haired man gives her a strained and wobbling smile as he nods his head. Honey and amber colored curls bobbing and weaving.

But, before she can slide out of the stool and in turn the mans hold, she's roughly jerked back and into the revolting man's embrace. The left side of her is flush against his plump and heated body. The feel of it, even through her leather jacket covered skin, makes a disgusted shudder run through her.

“C'mon girlie, stay a while, I'll show you a bit of fun,” the DomBeta tells her and then proceeds to grind himself into her hip bone.

The action makes her heart stop dead in her chest. The fear and flight of her damn second nature is rearing it's ugly head making her desperate to get up and away from this situation. But her anger and vile abuse born conditioning is a beast onto itself. Her second nature be damned she's a fighter, even if it's a lousy one.

“I'm only going to tell you once,” she says, her eyes locked somewhere between golden tinged curls and the dusty bottle of Jack perched on the wall. Slowly, the speed of a snail on Xanax, she allows her gaze to slide down and over to meet his lusty stare, “Get your filthy fucking hands off me.”

There's not a person in the bar who doesn't hear the growls she's infused into her voice. Growls only ever slipping out of an Alpha's throat. Angry things that rumble deep in her chest and shake the very roof of her tongue. She won't lie, she gets a sick kind of joy, watching the surprise that flutters over his features and smelling it in the air.

The bartender hadn't been way off base sending her away. After all, she's not much by way of body build. She's 108, starved and malnourished because she walks around only ever carrying less than five bucks. She's a slip of a thing that can barely fill out her once too tight clothes. Her head barely ever rises over anything as she stands at an even five feet. She's well aware of the fact that Alphas and Betas—and whatever willing Gamma—thinks she's easy prey. Her big wide eyes don't help her, or the soft slopes of her features. Her lush and plump pouting lips are enough to warrant every day harassment. And no matter the wear and tear of a rough life marking her from head to toe, she still looks like she's stuck somewhere in her teens.

To hear such vicious, feral and dominate growls rip from her lips as she bares her sharp canines is enough to startle anyone.

For the barest of moments, the mans hold on her loosens and if she wanted to—and she should—she could very well just slip right out with him still locked in his stupor.

But she's growled, growled a challenge and met his admiring gaze with one of a fight. He's a DomBeta and she is—for all instances and purposes—a Gamma by appearance. She technically has no right to refuse him so boldly. In fact, she's more than already initiated a fight between them both.

Quirking up a dark bushy brow, the drunken man, asks—his tone hard and imposing—trying to use his superior Rank against her, “You challenging me, girlie?”

“Not as long as you do as your told,” she growls out, her teeth bared and a steely glint to her gaze. She's not about to back down. Not in a room full of Betas, Gammas and some Alphas. Even if she manages to slip past this hulking fuck, anyone can snatch her up and force her to bare her throat. There's no happy ending to this shit-fest she's begun for herself. But she's not about to bow out and give them a chance to bend her over.

Over her fucking dead body.

The fingers on her hip dig in harshly and she just knows there'll be bruises in the morning. Like a flash his face jerks close to her, close enough that their noses are but a hairs breadth away from one another. His dark eyes are swirling, the glaze of alcohol washed away by the glow of rage and growing testosterone. He was just as reluctant as she to let this fight go. The anger making his features stretch out his bite out in her face, “It'll be a cold day in hell when some Gamma whore tells me what to do. I've seen you around girlie, running up and down the red light streets and sitting at corners. Selling your bit of ass for a couple of twenties.”

“Yeah,” she drawls out nice and low, “I am a whore and I do sell my bit of ass for a couple of twenties” she admits easily, no tremble or drop in the challenging husk of her voice, “But even I won't fuck an ugly shit like you, not for all the money in your pocket.”

With all the grace of a raging bull, his meaty fist flashes up and grips her chin tight and painfully as he growls savagely in her face, “You fucking—”

But before he can finish his sentence her hand has slipped out of her front jacket pocket baring with it her night time insurance. In a flash of silver metal, she artfully slips the piece of steel between her palm and slams it down on the hand he has kept on the dirty counter top.

108 pounds heavy, starved and five foot tall she may be—but—that didn't make her a weakling. The knife digs in past flesh and bone and impales itself into the wood. Her face is released as a pained roar falls from his lips, but, it quickly swings over in a large arch to back hand her across the face.

She ducks out of the way only barely missing it before turning slightly to the left and gripping an idle and half full beer bottle. Grip tight and eyes hard, she cracks the bottle across his head and lets satisfaction bloom in her chest in the way beer and glass spread upon him. In a crumbled—almost lifeless—heap he falls onto the ground at her feet. The thick crimson liquid of his blood pooling just slight and mixing with the spilled beer. He doesn't lay flat on the ground as he's partially propped up by the hand that is still skewered through with her knife.

It's then—chest heaving, growls spilling from her lips and teeth bared—that she notices how utterly quiet it's gotten.

The thick and strained kind of silence one only ever found on the scene of a death.

The kind that made the hair on the back of her neck stand on end.

Jutting her chin out and issuing a warning growl to the whole of the room she slips off her bar stool. The dull thud of her scuffed and worn down combat boots echoing in her ears alone. There's a little bundle of nerves and fear steadily growing in the pit of her stomach. She's not entirely sure what the bartender meant when he said this wasn't the run of the mil bar. But, she's not bent on finding out anymore.

With an ease she does not internally possess, she grips the black handle of her switch blade and pulls the knife from where she's impaled it. There's a low ' _shlinck_ _'_ sound where the knife is pulled through wood and flesh. Then a heavy ' _oof_ ' where the mans body is finally allowed to crumble fully onto the dirty floor.

Cleaning the knife of blood on her black skinnies, she eyes the man behind the bar—careful not to show her back to the on lookers—and tells him with a strained smile, “Like I said, I can handle myself.”

And just as easily as she had strolled in she walks right back out. The filthy air of the dirty alleyway clearing away some of the fear coiling in her stomach.

 

* * *

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Soooooo, at first I had intended on having our favorite red lycra wearing anti-hero appearing on this chapter. You know, saving the day, uttering something witty/Fantastic/Funny or awesome. But then I thought. Why the hell does my OFC need to be rescued? She's a fighter and she can do this!  
> (Plus, I'm not that great with the whole being Funny or witty)  
> Thoughts????
> 
>  
> 
> (P.S. I'm debating whether or not DP should make an appearance after all of this. Any suggestions on how to handle his dialogue is welcome. As in, desperately needed!!!)


	6. Wells running dry...

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "He's the iconic image of a junky on a bend and he thinks she looks like shit. What the hell did that say about her."

 

 

* * *

 

**!!!!** **Warning!!!!**

**Mentions of Drug Use and Sexual Solicitation!**

* * *

 

Snow – slang for Cocaine

Bombita – mexican slang for Heroin

 

* * *

 

 

 

 

“You look like shit kid,” her dealer says the moment he catches sight of her.

Coming from him, that's really saying something, considering he isn't the perfect picture of health either. He's a thin looking man, almost skeletal. His paper pale skin is littered in cuts, sores and scars. Under his dark brown eyes are heavy black bags that show he hasn't slept in weeks. His crooked chipped teeth are a shade of deep yellow that borders on brown. He's got bloodshot eyes and a bluish tint to him. Clearly, he's three shots away from deaths door.

He's the iconic image of a junky on a bend and _he_ thinks **she** looks like shit. What the hell did that say about her.

Shrugging her shoulders she grumbles through a rough and dry voice, “Shit Jay, with lines like that I'm surprised girls aren't knocking down your door.”

“Hmm, I try,” he rumbles back before casting wary glances over her shoulder and then back over his.

Together they stand in a filthy, trash littered, darkened alleyway. The scent of rotting trash and sewage makes her rolling stomach twist. The trash and scent of filth assures them that outsiders won't be wandering accidentally past them as they conduct their business. But still, he is weary, because what he sells to her isn't the run of the mill drugs.

Sure, she sometimes buys the occasional bag of Snow, Bombita or pharmaceuticals when she needs them. But, today's bag of goodies aren't anything fun and worthy of a night spent with questionable company. No. Today's bag is filled to the brim with Heat Suppressors and Hormone Blockers.

Without preamble or hesitance, she hands over the large wad of rolled up bills to her dealer. He takes it easily enough. His calloused fingers lightly grazing over her dry ones as money changes hands. He doesn't bother to count the cash because she's done enough because she's done enough good business that he has some small semblance of trust towards her.

A black plastic bag is whats thrust at her. It's half full, the glass vials clinking lightly against one another. She too doesn't bother checking to see if the amount is what they've agreed. Jay-Jay was a dealer hopped up on crack, but he was a good business man. He didn't skimp out his clients. Not in a time like this—crumbling buildings from the alien/villain attacks—hard times. There were dealers on every corner of every block. He didn't need that kind of talk on the street about his bags being found lacking.

She's just shy of nodding her head at him in goodbye when his hoarse voice stills her, “I don't think I'll be able to see you anytime soon kid.”

“Oh?” she questions, fighting hard to keep fear from spiking in her chest. There's few, if not none, who she trusts. And though it doesn't seem normal—or even safe—to other people, but, she trusts Jay-Jay. Trusts him more than she ought to really.

Raising her eyes to settle upon his, she stares at him in an act that might seem challenging to any dynamic. But, Jay-Jay, despite his rough and scarred up exterior of a fighting Beta is in fact a Gamma. He hides his scent of fresh cotton and mint with the smell of graveyard soil and weed. He hides his comforting scent of nurturing nature with the bite of narcotics in his blood. He hides it all behind the dead eye look of his glassy black eyes. He hides it so that he survives the black of the back alley business he conducts.

He knows—better than some—why a Dynamic may want to hide their second nature. He knows what he smuggles in for her. He knows and he's never once asked her over it or made it known to others. No doubt, by now, he knows exactly what she is despite her posturing.

“That shit is getting harder and harder to come by, babe,” Jay-Jay tells her only after he's running his dirty fingers through his greasy dark locks, “my connect, in the True North, says the wells gone dry up there.”

“What? Why?” she questions instantly. The mere thought of no longer having Suppressors on hand making everything in her twist.

Shrugging his shin shoulders he answers in a slur, “Shit's getting cut off, what-ever's out there on the street is about the end of it. The great U.S of A. is really upping their game sniffing this shit out. What you ave in your hands is about the last I'm gunna be able to sell to you until the heat goes down.”

tersely she nods her head and squares her shoulders, ignoring the panic growing in the pit of her stomach, “Well, thanks then, for this batch.”

“No problem little mama,” he smirks widely tossing at her a little bag of white pills for her to catch, “Need anything else, you know where to find me.”

Pocketing the bag of thirty odd sedatives and smiles back at him before leaving the dark back way. With a black bag stashed inside her black leather jacket she makes her way back to the flea bag motel she's been living out of. She's only halfway there before she bumps into a leering Beta with sharp fangs and a wad of hundreds tightly bundled.

Needless to say she goes back to her room with company. Needless to say she stuffs her goodies in the tank of her toilet. Needless to say that while she bends her body and whores it out, her mind races with the revolting thought that soon—very soon—she'll probably fall head first into a heat. Needless to say she cannot sleep that night and needless to say it has little to do with the stranger snoring on her bed.

 

* * *

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yes, I know, this update literally took us nowhere. I tried writing the apearence of at least one of our Avengers but it feels random and out of place. Yeah, I get the universe I'm writing about has to do with superheros and they do not follow logic and such. But, I want to write about my OFC and show you guys the dark road she's walked before she finds her way into the tower among our heroes. I want to show you guys that she is real and that her struggle is hard. At least, I hope I am conveying that.  
> But, I apologize for such a short update. I'm already writing chapter 7. no worries.
> 
> any who. Thoughts?  
> -Ani
> 
> (P.S. so yeah sorry to those who don't approve of drug use and or prostitution. There will be a lot, and I do mean A LOT, of mentions of self medication and dark issues as such. So prepare yourselves.)


	7. The Damsel in Distress

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “At the risk of sounding like every damsel-in-distress cliché ever made,” the blonde begins, her smile growing wider as she straightened her shoulders—proud and regal, “How can I make it up to you?"

 

* * *

 

 

She's somewhere between halfway there and almost under, by the time her skin starts that uncomfortable itch and burn. The undeniable need to keep swiping her tongue over her canines as they've become incredibly sensitive to touch. Her scalp is tingling, as if she's showered with too hot water despite the fact that the motel she stays at has none. But she ignores it in favor of digging her nails into her palms.

She's on edge, a nasty feeling. One where she feels like an exposed nerve being poked and prodded till she's dying. The overwhelming need to sink her teeth into something makes her squirm in her boots. Every noise that pops in her ears has her flashing her eyes back over her shoulders. There's a burning in her stomach that has little to do with its' empty state.

This discomfort is something she's grown accustomed to but abhors with every fiber in her being. The beginnings of her unscheduled _Heat_ approaching like a pack of wild mangy dogs, nipping at her heels. It's an unwelcomed sensation; one has effectively put a stall to with her illegal drugs.

But, Heat Suppressors and Hormone Blockers can only do so much. They dull the greater part of it. It keeps her from actually falling the red tinge of her second natures lust. It keeps her from wanting to bend over for any Alpha she happens to catch scent of. But, they don't dull the edge of the fear, of the adrenaline or the aggression pooling in her gut. They take away the need to mate but leave enough of it that she feels like going a few rounds—less with genitals and more with fists.

The aggressiveness, the jitters, the crawl beneath her skin, the bite to her smiles—all of it are what the Heat Suppressors and Hormone Blockers let bleed through.

It isn't ideal. But she'll take it. At least she's not a slave to her second nature—as much. At least they stave off the rolling tides of Hormones and stop the inevitable waves of Pheromones that present. (Pheromones that make it blatantly clear what she is.) It isn't ideal, but, it's better than nothing.

Gritting her teeth against the need to run her tongue over them, she stands stubbornly still just inside a dirty alleyway. The buildings that line the trash strewn street are broken and crumbling. They look old and smell of old filth. But word is, they used to be nice enough places for a quick squat. (Some hero related incident reduced them to their current state. Though which incident it was, she couldn't say, she wasn't around to watch them tumble down.)

Caught in the process of lighting a cigarette she catches the soft and subtle scents that just barely make it over the scent of burning tobacco.

At the mouth of the street stands a woman with strawberry blonde strands and golden skin that shimmered. Though she's dressed in regular casual clothing, there's something in the air around her that screams poise. She's dressed in skinny jeans with a white wash and a simple genderless v necked tee. She wears beige sandal booties that are reminiscent of gladiators. Hanging on her neck sits a golden band of some kind of jewelry. In her hand she holds a golden clutch bag.

Though she's dressed simply and there is an air of casualness to her—something deep in her belly tells her this blonde does not belong here.

“You don't need to explain it to me Scott, but, you and I both know he's not the kind of man to take no for an answer,” the blonde says suddenly. Her pale pink lips parting in an easy smile that falls from her so naturally. There's such warmth in her voice. Warmth only the rays of the sun can provide after a particularly bitterly cold night.

Something in her chest tugs sharply at the sound of it. Almost as if she's heard that voice before—whispering to her reassurances in moments of despair—and it feels like... _home_. But she roughly pushes those thoughts and feelings aside and blames the wonky side effects of the Heat Suppressors and Hormone Blockers. Because, she's never met that blonde woman before least of all heard her whisper any kind of words to her.

“Yeah, I figured. But trust me, if this was up to me, you can bet your ass I would have already signed on! I mean, seriously I get to be in the Ave—” the man who speaks now—his voice bright and happy is cut off, no doubt by whatever look the blonde sends his way, “Right, cloak and dagger and all that jazz. But, like I was saying, there'd be no problem if this was up to me. I'm a team player. But, I do what my Boss-Lady says and when she says it. Trust me when I say Big-Daddy Prym is a garden gnome compared to my Pack Momma.”

The man who stands opposite of the blonde woman with the pretty smile is relatively average. He does not stand very tall nor is thickly built. He's dressed in a dark black hoodie, a gray back pack slung over one shoulder, ratty torn jeans and flat chucks on his feet. His hair is dark and there's a show of slight gruff on his face. She's too far away to scent him—or the blonde for that matter—so she cannot tell where he is ranked in the hole pyramid of power.

The drugs dull her senses too so there's no chance she could make sense of them anyway. Colors aren't so vibrant when the drugs hit. Food tastes like ash and rational thoughts fly out the window. She's little more than a ball of anxiety riddled primal instincts now. Still, despite all the fresh dose being injected not one hour ago, something in her hind-brain rev up. Something like instinct warring against the stifling sludge of chemicals rushing through her. There's a pooling want—a _need_ —to somehow inch closer to the two at the mouth of the alleyway and scent them. A desperate thing that writhes hungrily to taste their rank on her tongue.

But she squashes that bit of herself down viciously. A growl vibrating in her chest to keep her stupidity in check. In an effort to keep her head screwed on straight she takes a half step backwards, cloaked by the shadows the crumbling buildings provide.

 _Fucking Omega bullshit_ , rings savagely in her mind, the ghost of her mothers voice.

“Hmmm,” the blonde hums softly, her smile gentle and warm—slightly teasing around the ends, “So I've heard. Still, I'd appreciate it, if you could speak to her on this matter. You lot are a highly debated topic at the Tower. Everyone is anticipating and welcoming you and your packs addition to the ranks. Especially a certain stationed guard where someone may or may not have broken into not a few months ago.”

“Oh shit, Falcon remembers that?” the man—possibly the same Scott the blonde had addressed in the beginning—grumbles out. His hand running harshly over his face as he huffs out a harsh breath, “I told him I was sorry about that. He's not still hung up on it is he?”

“He's an army veteran, on top of that he's a DomBeta. Of course he's still hung up on it. Like a dog with a bone that man,” the blonde softly laughs, her laughter ringing softly and delicately in the growing dark.

“Shit,” the man curses while scrubbing the back of his head and ruffling his dark hair, “I'll talk to the Boss-Lady, see how she feels now that most of the drama's blown over, but I can't make any promises. Ross, that hypocritical douche in a hand basket, really rolled us over with those Accords. Screwed the proverbial pooch. My packs gone underground as far as everyone else is concerned.”

“I understand, no one will hear otherwise from me. But, seriously considering our offer is all I ask for Scott, feel free to drop by anytime you wish. Everyone is eager to properly meet you,” the blonde tells him before they make their goodbyes.

And then, just as abruptly as their conversation had banished the silence, everything falls quiet. The only sounds being that of her own puffing and huffing off the dwindling white stick between her lips. Glancing at the lone blonde through the corner of her eyes she can make out the glow of a cellphone in her hands. The blonde woman, most likely, arranging for some kind of taxi service to steal her away from all this filth.

 _Good_ , she thinks—not at all bitter or angry, _the woman glowed to brightly and prettily to be caught in streets like these. Streets littered in people like me._

Lost in that thought, she almost misses the growing rustling and growls of an impending fight. Turning sharply to her left—down further into the dark alleyway—she can make out the shadows of two men. Large bulking figures pushing and edging each other on. It's a familiar sight, two Gammas psyching one another up, the less than playful nips and jostling to ramp up the intimidating scent of musk only they can emanate.

If they can ramp up their scent, mix it with something like iron or metal, paired together with a weapon of some sort. This tactic can scar off any passerby's. Even Betas.

Though, whether it's ever worked on an Alpha, she isn't sure.

Noticing their play for what it is—danger—she turns to eye the blonde still lounging casually at the mouth of the pathway. Pale golden hair tucked nicely behind one ear as she continues to fiddle with her silver gleaming phone. Flashing her eyes back to the approaching men she bites down on the growing anxiety that tells her to make herself scarce. Hopped up on drugs she isn't the most rational thinker.

Clenching her jaw tight she all but stomps out of the shadows and heads to the woman causing the all the fuss.

“You need to leave,” she grits out tightly, her teeth snapped against one another as her dark eyes meet baby powder blue.

“Excuse me?” the strawberry blonde startles at her abrupt approach and hard tone.

“You need to leave,” she repeats, her words more forceful as she can hear the approach of scuffing boots and growling males approach, “Now! You need to leave lady, shit's about to pop off real quick and I don't think you'll be up for it.”

“I'm sorry, I don't think I understand—” the blonde mutters with her perfectly maintained brows knitting in confusion.

Growling low in her throat, she rakes her fingers roughly through her messy brown locks and glares at the taller woman, “You see those guys?”

at this she cocks her neck backwards, into the alleyway, ever so slightly as to not rouse suspicion from those whom advance. When the blonde woman nods gently, she explains quickly, “They've got you in their sights. I don't know if they wanna rob you or something worse. But they've been amping each others scents up, revving up for a fucking fight or fuck—I don't know. Do yourself a favor and get out before they—l”

She doesn't get to finish her sentence before the two men suddenly fall upon them both. One is quick to push her aside and though the push isn't too hard she goes flying where she weighs little to nothing at all anymore. The words 'This ones ours whore' ringing until she hits the ground hard. She rolls and slides in the muck and the grime for a short while stilling only until a pile of broken bricks stops her. Her ears fill with the sound of males posturing and trying to intimidate another into submitting to their wills.

The sound makes chills of fear and disgust swirl in the pit of her stomach. A dawning sense of dread slips down her spine when she cranes her head upward to eye the scene before her. The blonde has been cornered. Her pale white shirt pressed up against the grime riddled walls of this place. The two Gamma's have boxed her in allowing her little room to retreat as they growl down at her.

“What's a posh looking girl like you doing down here on this side of town? Slumming it?” one of them growls down at the blonde.

“No,” the blonde replies with utter ease, as if she _wasn't_ staring down two near feral Gammas with fight pheromones leaking out of their every pore, “I am not slumming it. I was visiting a good friend of mine.”

“Oh?” one Gamma asks, his voice hard and rough from where he's grating it hard to produce those growls that don't come to him naturally.

And while their running off at the mouth, standing in defiance, posturing as if they were some gritty worn down Alphas, she's wrapped her hand around a good enough sized brick and has inched her way closer to the trio. The Gammas, they don't hear her approaching because they're too busy acting like dicks growling like teenage kids. They don't scent her for the blockers are good with neutralizing that bit.

So she sneaks up to one of them, the shorter one. The one who's head she can better reach. Pushing all the strength, all the anxiety and all that flowing adrenaline into her legs—she jumps up. Her hand, brick and all, comes down hard on his head with a dull thud. The Gamma she hits falls over like a felled tree.

“What the—” the remaining Gamma sputters, his growls immediately cut off, “You fucking whore!”

He lunges then; his fist comes flying at her. An angry slop haymaker that misses her by miles as she tilts out of the way. In her hand sits her knife waiting for whatever should come. But she simply bares her teeth at the Gamma. Long shiny canines that are longer than a Gammas or a Betas. Canines that gleam under the dingy light that manages to filter in. She bares her teeth at him and rumbles that unholy growl from the pit of her belly.

With a jerk back he freezes. His eyes going wide as he rakes his eyes over her. His face paling as he takes in the defensive and more than aggressive stance she has adopted. There's no doubt in his mind, this was a fight he will lose. Because, in his head, she's an Alpha by the intensity of that growl alone. So, he turns tail then dragging his friend by his foot to flee the scene. That sick sense of joy she gets for making others jump at her growl floods her. For a moment, a sense of twisted pride washes away the sludge of the suppressors and lets her feel something nice.

“I guess I should say thank you,” the blonde woman’s voice suddenly cuts through the left over tension.

In a flash, her dark eyes find her. The blonde no longer stands pressed against the dark walls but casually with her hands so carefully extended on her sides. There sits a lopsided smile that screams of awkwardness and a light gleaming in her pale eyes.

“At the risk of sounding like every damsel-in-distress cliché ever made,” the blonde begins, her smile growing wider as she straightened her shoulders—proud and regal, “How can I make it up to you?"

“Uh, not necessary lady,” she tells the beautiful woman quickly. Feeling suddenly unworthy of standing before the blonde and having that brilliant smile directed at her.

Shaking her golden head the woman says, “No, I insist! You saved me from a rather risky situation. One which, I have no doubt, would not have ended prettily for all involved. So please, let me at least buy my Knight in shining armor some lunch, as thanks. After all, it's not everyday a girl gets saved like _that_.”

A heavy and dark no sits just at the edge of tongue. She wants to tell the blonde—beautiful and warm as she looks—nice and wonderful as her face looks—to get the hell out of here, that this is no place for her, but, she cannot. Blame it on her wonky state—stretched and twisted as she is with the muffled heat and the drugs in her system—looking into that inviting smile makes every frayed nerve calm. Looking into those peaceful blue eyes makes the weariness in her bones melt away.

And now that she stands so close to her, she can finally make out the womans scent. The woman's scent is made of warm chamomile and ginger. Like freshly washed sheets set to dry on the warm baking sun. She smells so calming, so inviting, so wonderfully pleasant—she's glad she's just recently dosed herself. Otherwise, she would have long since jumped the woman and assaulted her by plunging her nose into the crook of her neck. That scent makes the jumpy/jittery/paranoid set of her anxious hindbrain still. The fog that has settled over her eyes clears as she breathes in that scent and allows her to slow her racing heart, if only for a moment.

That smell—like the blondes voice—tastes familiar. It tugs on the long ignored—long abused—instincts of her true nature—true dynamic.

So, she blames that scent for the way she jerkily nods her head and follows the blonde out of the alleyway.

As they exit the seedy little street she conducts her business the blonde tosses over her shoulder, “Now, what would my Knight like for lunch?”

 

* * *

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So can anyone guess who the blonde is????  
> Or Scott for that matter???  
> (Did I involve more Heroes? I might've.)  
> ^_^
> 
>  
> 
> So yeah, this chapter just kinda came at from left field. I was hoping to get some momentum going but it just wouldn't do. Every time I tried to hurry it up I absolutely hated it.  
> Oh and if it feels wonky, as far as flow, blame it on my son and his need to blast K-pop 24/7 and forcing me to watch the music videos with him. (He's a major fan of Taemin.) Also, Law & Order has become my permanent muse for this story so if it bleeds through, I apologize for none of it.  
> Hope you guys enjoyed.  
> Hope you'll drop a line, or something.  
> Thanks for reading!  
> -Ani<3
> 
>  
> 
> [P.S. This story has been so fun to write. I am enjoying myself immensely.]


	8. Role Reversal

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Well, hate to piss on your progressive parade, but what I do is exactly who I am,”

 

* * *

 

 

 

Thanks, on the street, usually meant someone tossed you a buck every now and again. Thanks, on the street, sometimes, were paid for in flesh and services. Thanks, on the street, often times was simply being left alive with no bleeding wounds.

So when the blonde woman tells her she's going to buy her lunch as thanks. Well, she isn't expecting much. Maybe a hot dog from that fat man on the corner or a burger from down the way. She isn't expecting much, but, she follows the woman regardless.

 _What's the harm_ , she'd thought, _Especially when she smells so good_.

She isn't expecting for the blonde to usher her into a sleek looking black benz. Thanks, on the street, did not include being swept off to some fancy looking restaurant with a name she couldn't begin to pronounce. This was all a little beyond her.

All of it leaving her to feel like a fish out of water.

There's white pressed and gleaming cloth draped over their little table. Pristine silverware so polished she can see her reflection off the back of the spoon. The people that file in reek of money in their expensive suits and pretty dresses. The air smells like something sweet— _too sweet_ —artificial and decidedly _expensive_. It makes her scrounge up her nose in displeasure. Secretly she's glad she's got the drugs dulling her senses now.

(Her sense of smell has always been both a blessing and a curse. She can scent people from miles away—not literally, but close enough—so she was never really surprised with the approach of a Beta, or worse an Alpha. But, that sense has always been a double edged sword. In the throes of a heat it became hell. To be able to scent whatever viable specimen was in her general vicinity.

Now, in a place like this and a time like now, she's a little more than relieved.)

“So,” the blonde finally speaks, after she's sent the waiter away with a delicate wave of her hand, “let's introduce ourselves first. My name is Virginia Potts. But, my friends call me Pepper.”

For a moment she stays quiet. Her eyes roving over the blondes perfectly tanned face. Searching for something dark and malicious that might explain why shes wound up in such a high quality joint. Was the blonde secretly in the sex trade and about to sell her off? Or were her organs in danger of being hacked out and sold at a nominal fee. But, she finds nothing but that warmth again. She smells nothing but chamomile, ginger and tastes like the warmth of a lazy morning.

“Lela,” she slowly announces, her voice sounding harsh and rough—rougher than a woman's voice had any right to be—sounding ugly against the blondes soft voice, “My names Lela.”

There'd been a moments hesitation before she had uttered her name. She'd thought of maybe donning a fake name, as she often did on the streets, so easy to wear Carmen, Lola, Ana or Sofia with her ethnically inclined face.

“Hmmm, Lela,” the blonde—Ms. Potts says, tasting her name on her tongue. Pepper's American accent making it lift where it shouldn't. But, she ignores it—because it happens more than she'd like to count—and allows Ms. Potts to continue onward, “Well, Lela, I'd like to formally thank you for that little altercation back there.”

“It was no big deal, really. Anyone would've done it,” Lela grumbles, her right hand going to scratch the back of her neck as she chewed on her bottom lip. Her nicotine addiction rearing it's nasty little head as she shifts uncomfortably on a soft cushioned chair.

“Well, I beg to differ. There's not many people out there that would willingly risk their sense of safety for a total stranger. Least of all against two revved up Gammas like that,” Ms. Potts adamantly tells her. Her light brown brows furrowing as she pinned her with those baby blue eyes.

Shrugging her shoulders while feeling decidedly out of place, Lela mumbles, “If you say so dude.”

“I do,” Ms. Potts states with a firm and confident nod of her head. With a smile she leans her body forward and asks, “So tell me a little about yourself! I'd like to get to know my knight in shinning armor, as it were.”

Maybe it's the situation she finds herself in or the whole of the events that have transpired in the last couple of hours. Maybe it is the absurdity of the question or the hideousness of the answer. Whatever it is, it kind of makes her snap. It makes a bitter sarcastic laugh bubble out from the mid of her chest out past her chapped lips. A twisted small smile spreads on her face. A reflection of her bitter self and all.

“You want to know a little about me? I'm a whore,” she says with a wave of her ringed left hand. Bringing more attention to the state of dress she finds herself in this afternoon. A tight red halter top, made of some spandex type material, hugs her torso and ends just past her small breasts. Over that was her ever present black leather jacket. On her waist she dons a faded black jean skirt. One that she's altered to make shorter for... _convenience_. On her feet she wears her usual black boots because she wasn't about to pull on those high heels. (Heels slowed her down when she needed to book out of risky situations.)

She is dressed gritty; nowhere near as refined as the blonde before her; her lips smeared in blood red lipstick covering up the splits and cracks of her dried flesh. Her eyes lined in black liner that smears out around the edges from rubbing her eyes in weariness. (It doesn't look half bad most days. Looking more intentional, for the smokey eyed effect.) There's no way around it. She's dressed just as a hooker ought to be.

“What else is there to say about me?” she asks sardonically. Her tone is as bitter as the smile stretched wide on her face.

The blonde, for all her elegant nature, jerks back in surprise. Her powder blue eyes widening and her pale pink lips dropping open in a silent, 'Oh'. But, the blonde is well mannered it seems, for she is quick to school her expression and offer a simple smile and a soft, “I see.”

“Yeah,” Lela drawls out nice and slow, her hands rummaging around in her jacket pocket for her zippo and her cigarettes. When a white stick dangles from her lips, smoking and filling her lungs in beautiful toxic fumes, does she finally finish, “I'm no knight. Just your garden variety Hooker.”

“Surely, that can't be everything about yourself?” Ms. Potts argues, her eyes taking on a soft look, “For instances, I am the head CEO of a multibillion dollar company, but, that isn't who I am. I'm Pepper; I'm nearing my thirty-fifth birthday and I am adamantly refusing to acknowledge it. So I'll never repeat that again. I like to binge watch Friends episodes on my down time, but, lately I've begun to take up Penny Dreadful. I like to paint when I can and I've just recently taken up Kick Boxing.”

Blowing out a lungful of smoke Lela remains quiet long after Ms Potts— _Pepper_ stops speaking. There's such an earnest expression across those beautifully tan features while Pepper waits for her to speak. An expression of hope and honesty that makes everything in Lela cringe up in reflex.

Honesty was for suckers in her experience. An all too easy in for every monster with a razor blade, brass knuckles or desperate means.

“Contrary to popular belief, I am not a robot who does nothing else but sign papers all day long. I am a person underneath all of this,” Ms. Potts waves a hand at herself, heedlessly—elegantly, “Once upon a time, I was just some kid from Terre Haute, Indiana. Who ran around barefoot and ate twinkies on the side of boloney sandwiches. People might've called me white trash then. But, What I did and what I do now, does not define me. Nor should what you do for a living define all that you are.”

Her words—Pepper's words, so simple and uttered so carelessly firm—hit her in the gut like a stray brick being chucked. By reflexes alone, Lela scowls at the blonde and brings her cigarette to her lips.

“Well, hate to piss on your progressive parade, but what I do is exactly who I am,” she grumbles roughly. Her dark eyes fixing themselves on the waiter that dithers just behind Ms. Potts. A young man dressed sharp in his crisp white shirt and black slacks. His brown eyes meeting hers only narrowly before they flashed down to his hands where he rearranged plates and utensils.

The scent of distress hanging about him and sitting heavy on his slim shoulders. Clearly, the young man—a Gamma by the smell of him—had sharp ears, for he had heard he rather loud declaration of what—or who—she was.

“Hmm, yes well… Are you new around here?” Ms. Potts questions, neatly and beautifully changing topics with nary a drop of awkwardness in her tone, “I only ask, because your accent, it isn't from around here. Is it?”

Every inch of her coils tight with tension at the question. Such an innocent, seemingly, harmless little inquiry that traveled down a dark pathway into her past. By all means, Lela should lie and offer something in the total opposite direction. Or better yet, she shouldn't answer at all. Lela should just get up and leave the blonde woman alone to eat her supper.

But, she only need to glance upward and catch herself in that clear honest gaze for her resolve to falter—ever so lightly. The smell of crisp cleanliness drawing her in like a lost mouth to a lone flicker of candle light.

“I just pulled in, about four five months ago, I'm from Texas originally,” Lela answers honestly. Honesty, such a strange sensation on her tongue.

Two blonde, perfectly manicured, brows rise up in surprise at that, “Oh? You don't really sound...Texan.”

Resisting the urge to roll her eyes and only barely succeeding, she scoffs lightly while she flicks her ash onto a pristine white plate, “What do Texan's usually sound like? John Wayne-ish with a dash of Clint Eastwood thrown in?”

“Wha—no! I just, I thought the accent would be...heavier?” Pepper stumbles with a wide smile and a light laugh.

“I'm from the southern _southern_ part of Texas. A no named border town, we have our own little twang compared to the northern most parts,” Lela tells her as a reluctant smile slowly tips the end of her lips.

“Hmm, I guess that would make sense,” Pepper concedes with a wide bright smile of her own. Acting, as if, for all the world Lela had just imparted her with grand enough insight to rival that of Ghandi's.

And just like that, slowly but surely, the conversation is steered—by Peppers expert hand—over all manners of things. Things like, how is Lela enjoying NYC and all it's many historical sights. Things like, what part of Texas is she from and did everyone ride around on horses. Things like, what was to be ordered over the meal.

All of it flowing so smoothly, laughs shared here and there, that Lela almost forgets that before today she's never seen or spoken to this woman. The discomfort she felt coming into all of this—the jittery drive of the suppressants and H-blockers—leaving in a snap. All of it falling away as if it never existed over the two prime cut T-Bone steaks Pepper ordered for them both.

Everything about the woman, her smooth words, her radiant smiles, her calm demeanor, laying her restless nerves to bed. Sitting with the woman—speaking to her and simply acting as if she was not some starved rabid beast on the corner of a dangerous street—made her head feel fuzzy. Like slipping into a warm bath, that was Pepper, warmth and care enveloping you simply with the scent of her peaceful Beta chamomile and ginger tang.

Lela's half way through inhaling her mammoth sized order of meat before she realizes just how sated she feels. Carefully, she allows her eyes to flicker upward and over to the blonde that sits adjacent to herself. Pepper eats slowly and refined, her fork and knife working carefully through her half burnt meal. Every so often blue eyes pull up and a warm easy smile spreads across her gorgeous face.

For the life of her, Lela can't figure out why she feels so...at peace with this woman—this stranger. She blames it on that scent. That smooth and easy scent that glides over the artificial garbage hanging in the air. Lela blames it on the scent and the irrational emotions that it causes to swell up within her.

“So,” the sudden break in silence causes her to startle forward, if only by a centimeter, Peppers clear blue eyes fixed upon her face, “I've been sitting here trying to reason with myself, this whole time we've spent eating, that what you do with your life is none of my business. Because, it isn't, it's your life and your body. You have a right to do whatever you see fit with it. You make your own choices. But, I can't. I _cannot_. **Nope**.”

Furrowing her dark brows, Lela swallows the seasoned mashed potatoes sitting on her tongue and asks, very confused, “Okay?”

“Lela, darling, you look like you're fresh out of highschool—you look like a kid,” Pepper exclaims, her hands flashing up and out in her outrage. Her fork and knife abandoned upon the gold trimmed porcelain plate.

“Pepper,” Lela starts, and oh how strange it was to have that name roll so casually off her tongue—as if it, better yet, She had been saying that name all her life, “I'm twenty two, I'm not a kid.”

“Twenty-two?” Pepper repeats, shock evident in her sky blue orbs as they trace the jagged lines of her face, “Well, that hardly makes you an adult! Still, I cannot in good conscience finish having this meal with you and then toss you back out onto the streets. I'd feel as if I was throwing you to the hungry wolves, as it were.”

Waving a dismissive hand of her own, Lela leans back in her chair and tells the blonde, a wry smile spread coldly across her lips, “If you're worried about me winding up dead, or worse, I'll tell ya here and now: You aint got nothing to worry about. I've been half raised by those wolves you're so worried about.”

Something akin to anguish causes the elegant planes of Pepper's face to twist and pinch as she drops her glare onto her uneaten meal, “That doesn't exactly comfort me Lela.”

“I'm sorry?” Lela offers with an awkward shrug, “But, it's the truth Pepper. I know I don't look like much, but, I'm a fighter. I can handle myself.”

A wiggle, something like the slithering of a dirty little earth worm, slides across the recess of her hindbrain. The shriveled up dead things—repressed and beaten shits—of her true nature attempt to stir to life at the smell that suddenly comes flooding out of the blonde woman. Distress, the bitter stench of it filling up her nose and making her insides squirm.

It's not the first time she's scented the smell of a Beta's distress. Rare though they may be, according the to the social media, it's a regular occurrence when one lives the life she does. Hookers, as a whole, come in all shapes and sizes—Pimps too. There's just as many Alphas in heels as well as in dirty wife beaters. She knows plenty of prostitute Betas running around here. Enough of them to have scented them when they run into a wall and get some beatings.

The smell of their distress is always bitter—like vinegar with a hint of something distinctly sulfuric. It's an ugly smell. A wretched thing that's meant to alarm the Pack-Whole. A nasty thing born to make an Alpha Pack-Master take notice and action. A smell meant to alert anyone of danger.

Distress scents in Betas were like bombs waiting to go off. It didn't matter who or what your walk of life, if a Beta distress scent was raised it was like a beacon to all other dynamics. A call for help and aid of whatever kind. A tricky thing to deal with if anyone was doing anything illegal. But a helpful tool to stay alive should the need for it arise.

“You might want to chill out a bit there Beta,” Lela tells the blonde sternly through tight lips, “I won't be subjected to some bullshit arrest on unlawfully distressing a Beta because you lost your shit.”

The mention of the strict law—and the non-mention of its harsher punishment—snaps Pepper out of her dwindling state. It takes a total of eight deep breaths before the smell begins to subside and clear away. If any passer by took notice, no one raises a stink over it. All stays nice and quiet as Lela glares at her surroundings.

“I'm sorry,” Pepper half stutters out as she places her elbows upon the table top. Her head hung and her shoulders slumped, but, her clear blue eyes boring holes into Lela's head, “I just want to help you. I don't want to let you walk out of here back—back to that kind of life without...without helping you in whatever way I can.”

“Look,” Lela starts, pushing away her empty plate in a rough movement that had no business in such a swanky place like this, “If you think you owe me, because of that shit back there, you don't. I didn't do it thinking to hang one over you. I just...”

She falters there, because, really why had she helped Pepper back there? Back there, Pepper had just been some naive little blonde who wandered down the wrong alleyway. Lela could have simply minded her business and turned away. It would not have been her first time ignoring something like that for the sake of survival or simple reluctance. The streets breed monsters only ever caring about their own survival. Stepping in and stopping those doped up, revved up, Gamma's had not been a smart move.

There was no reason for her to step in, but, she had. Why? Lela doesn't rightly know.

“It was the right thing to do, that's why,” Pepper finishes for her when the silence stretches out too long.

The right thing to do? The words almost make her laugh. Lela hasn't done anything right since the day she presented and probably way before then too. None of Lela's actions were ever right. Nothing she ever did was for the sake of simply helping or any stroke of goodwill. She's a sharp edge, a jagged knife rusted over, a creature molded by the shadows of the backways she haunts.

 _But, I did, didn't I_ , her treacherous mind supplies against her will. Her stoned out hindbrain whispering black words, _I helped her because no one ever helps. No one ever stops when someone's been cornered. Especially when it's me._

Almost as if sensing the dark thoughts rushing through her brain, Pepper speaks up and half banishes them all away, “You did the right thing by helping me back there. Even when you didn't know me. When you didn't need to and even while it was dangerous. So I want to help you, I want to do right too.”

There's a heavy silence that rings after Pepper has spoken. Her blue eyes swirling with some unknown emotion trapped within them. There's a determined tilt to Pepper's jaw and a stubborn slant to her squared shoulders. All of it making her look utterly gorgeous, Lela's almost blinded by it.

“I can help you, I want to help you, please.” Pepper at last utters in half a plea.

No, sits like a loaded bullet on her tongue as she sits there. But again, she finds herself unable to say it.

Lela should, has all the reason in the world, to tell Pepper to fuck—right the fuck—off. She's not some damsel in distress, nope, not at all. She's not Julia Roberts, Hooker with a Heart of Gold. Nor is she little orphan Annie, with enough good in her to save. She's also not some main character in a poorly written romance either! She can damn well take care of herself. She doesn't need some swanky billionaire to think she can throw her some bills and make her life roses. If ever Lela's getting anywhere it's by the grit on her knees and the grease of her elbows.

Bitterness and anger swell high in her belly and lick up her throat. Turning to lead the exquisite meal she's scarfed down scant seconds ago. She wants to scream at Pepper. She wants to tell her that not everyone is so lucky to get second chances and that Pepper shouldn't squander them on someone like Lela.

Lela who was dirty.

Lela who was so damn damaged.

Lela who was born in the wrong rank.

Oh, but isn't it tempting? So very tempting, for Lela to nod her head at Pepper's offer. How easy would it be for her to sink her claws into Peppers coat tails and ride it the fuck out of the hellish mud she's up to her neck in.

biting back the acid that threatens to spill past her sharp teeth, Lela forces out a lie as civilly as she can, “Pepper, you seem like a nice person, you and I? You and I are two different kind of animals.”

Well, not all of it is lies.

“I helped you because if you got killed, or worse, then they'd tape that block off for however long it takes to clean it all back up,” Lela tells the blonde, “and it may not look like much to you, but that alley right there, that's my bread and butter. Most of my revenue comes in by that corner right there. I helped you out of necessity. Nothing more and nothing less.”

That, was mostly lies. Lela was no stranger to standing in barely dried blood and still managing to turn enough tricks to pay the motel bill.

Undeterred and neither shocked or entirely pleased, Pepper holds her ground as only a tyrant of business can and tells her as plainly as she can, “Liar. But, be that as it may, I still wish to help you.”

Oh, and doesn't that just throw her for a damn loop. Because, what? Pepper knows her fall of sixty/seventy minutes and already is sniffing out Lela's lies and that's dangerous. As dangerous as a loaded gun held to Lela's bony chest.

“Why?” Lela asks, going for gruff but winding up sounding just as she felt—winded.

“Because, I can,” Peppers tone is firm as unyielding mountain, her eyes steady as sky in the middle of summer days, “Because, what's the point of having all that I do if I can't help one single damn person? Because, there was a time when you are who I could've been. Because, if I don't help you...who will?”

As previously entertained, the thought to tell Pepper where to stuff it, comes unbidden to the forefront of her mind. Instead what comes tumbling from her lips is a laugh. One that isn't weighed or twisted with the helplessness of her shit storm of a life. A laugh that makes her sides hurt and stretches the cuts on her lips until they bleed. A laugh that makes her feel like she's gone topsy-turvy and should seek professional help.

After she's caught her breath she wheezes out a breathless, “I thought _I_ was supposed to be the Knight today?"

 

* * *

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh My Effin' God's and Goddesses!!!!  
> I thought I had already published this chapter! On a damn whim I checked it out and realized I had put this in the draft section!!!!  
> FORGIVE ME!!!!
> 
> Please let me know what y'all thought on all of this.  
> (This had been a doozy to write! It was supposed to go so dark towards the end, but, I decided against it because after leaving it behind to gather dust, I figure you beautiful people don't deserve my nonsense!!!)
> 
> -Ani<3


	9. Shit Decisions

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Taking on Alphas, getting them in your bed, are risks she shouldn't be taking—are risks none of the working girls like to take on—but are ultimately what they have to deal with. And though she can take care of herself in a fair fight, being locked up in a room with a hormone driven Alpha rarely ends the well for her."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TRIGGER WARNING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  
> Non-Con and after math.

 

 

 

* * *

_-8 (or so) months later-_

“So,” he begins, only after catching his breath, his eyes roaming over the naked expanse of her torso, “I'm curious, are you one of those who believe?”

“Believe?” she parrots back from around the butt of a lit cigarette dangling from her lips. Lazily she wipes the sweat from her brow and tries her damnedest to move away from the naked stranger lying across the bed from her.

Nodding his head the stranger carefully lifts his light brown gaze to meet her own dark eyes as he explains his strange question, “A true mate believer, are you one?”

She cannot help the involuntary scoff that leaves her lips at that. Her eyes rolling in a thoroughly dramatic and sarcastic manner as well.

“I'll take that as a no?” he questions, his lips turned up into a sardonic smile.

“What's there to believe?” she flips around on him, something old and bitter rising in her chest, “That somewhere out there, there's some kind of _perfect mate_ for you—made for you. Who's scent is utterly and truly compatible with yours unlike any and all who've come before them? A _mate_ who can form a _true bond_. Do I look like I'm a seven year old? That shits the stuff for bad princess movies. Shit rumors worse than Sasquatch.”

“They aren't _rumors_ ,” the man argues sternly, his brown brows furrowed and his plain features pulled down by the offended frown he know sports, “There's tons of proof of _True Mates_. Scientific articles are always published about them. About how the _bonds_ between _True Mates_ are actual fact. A real link that surpasses mental and emotional states—”

“I'm pretty sure they lied,” she snaps, angry for no other reason than the fact that something so fucking stupid and absurd—like _True Mates_ —was being argued to her by none other than a fucking John.

She knows she should stop. No good ever came from arguing with Johns this late into the evening. Less so when the said John was an Alpha. And he was, the stranger lying less than an arms breadth away, was of an Alpha deposition. His scent thick and musky almost, reeking of testosterone and burnt leather. A scent meant to overwhelm and subdue those of lesser dynamics.

It wasn't often she took on Alpha's as clientele, but, there were times when she was hard pressed for the cash. (Like she was now.) She didn't take them on for the fact that Alphas, almost always, come stalking with a goal in mind. Always looking for something smaller than them to mount, knot, and dominate if only for the night and by the grace of the money in their wallets. A distinctive need driven by their nature to look for Omegas even if all that's available are Betas and Gammas made present.

Taking on Alphas as Johns always came with the risk that they might want something a little more than fucking and knotting. Sometimes Alphas came on the brink of their Rut. Looking for somebody to keep for the high tide of their hormone driven craze. Alphas on a Rut was not something one wanted to do with a stranger. Things got dangerous then.

She has enough scars and mended bones to remind her why Alphas in season were bad decisions in the making.

But, she hasn't eaten in nearly five days now, aside from that sandwich she fished out of the dump the other day. (Though she'd thrown it right back up the moment it went down, so she doubts it counts.) Taking on Alphas, getting them in your bed, are risks she shouldn't be taking—are risks none of the working girls like to take on—but are ultimately what they have to deal with. And though she can take care of herself in a fair fight, being locked up in a room with a hormone driven Alpha rarely ends the well for her.

And this guy, he's starting to smell like he might be on the cusp of a rut any day now. The lingering taste of hormones sitting heavy in the air around him. No doubt, this is the reason why he's slammed down five hundred dollars to keep her around till morning. No doubt, this is the reason why every time he bends her over there's a little feral energy that makes his hands tremble just a tad.

“Well, I believe,” the stranger tells her, crossing his arms underneath his auburn head. His eyes now fixed on the popcorn texture of the seedy motel room he's rented out for the duration of the night.

Flicking the growing ash of her cigarette away, she eyes him carefully, taking in his relaxed posture and the way he lounges in naught but his bare skin upon the harsh material of the rented bed. No line in his body—that is neither toned nor unfit—shows signs of stress or anger. For all instances and purposes, the stranger—whose name he refused to give out—was as calm as could be. And maybe, if she wasn't well versed in the ability to sniff out those minute changes in scent, she would have missed it.

The strangers scent, that was thick enough to nearly suffocate, had turned just a tad bit sour. Sour like milk left out in the summer heat. Sour like he was displeased and offended but was trying to reign in his ire. Sour like he wanted to argue further but was trying not to really fight when what he wanted was lying naked beside him. Sour enough to make the hairs at the nape of her neck stand on edge. Sour enough to make those flight instincts in her kick up. Sour enough to wake a deep disgusting need to bare her throat in submission for her misstep flare up as well. Sour enough that if not for her iron clad will of control on her nature were not there, she would be forced to present herself to him on the smell alone.

Thankfully, her dynamic does not rule her. She's been out on the street, witnessed enough bullshit, and endured enough horrors that she does not cower as she rightly should.

Ignoring the throb in her head that screams at her to run and hide or present and submit, she inhales a thick heavy cloud of smoke and lazily drawls at him, “Well, that's all well and good, but I'm pretty sure you're paying me to fuck you, not argue about the hypothetical existence of _True Mates_.”

Her words seem to nearly startle the man out of whatever daze he found himself in. His head snapping to the side so that he might glare at her with enough intensity that would have cowed her in her younger years. These days, she finds herself challenging gazes like that. Answering each glower, every aggressive growl, with one of her own.

“No,” he bites out, his features twisted and nearly angry, “ _I'm_ fucking _you_.”

Heaving a smoke filled sigh, she twirls her dying cigarette and passes an unimpressed look over the angry Alpha. She can see the tense pull of his muscles and the tightness to his jaw. The tight grip he now has on the yellowed sheets underneath his body a telling sign. But no more than the stench of his scent now pouring off him in waves. The smell of burnt leather and something distinctly illegal invading every inch of the air between them.

Blame it on years of bad habits, of leaving with blood on her teeth and busted knuckles, but she's got an ugly need in her to fight even when she should lay down and take it. The voice of her mother nagging, pulling and biting on her mind—forcing her to stand up straighter and square her shoulders for a fight rather than hunch in and play the peacemaker.

“Sure,” she drawls out, flicking the butt of the cigarette somewhere into the far corner of the room, “Whatever helps you get it up and ready to go.”

There's a beat of silence that then ensues. A ring of pure and utter nothingness that falls like a spell. Loud enough to drown out the clatter from the next room over. Loud enough that she can barely hear the rabbit beat of her heart. It last barely a second or two before it breaks like a glass cup. A clatter of noise then happens as the stranger lunges at her. His ham like hand wrapping tightly around her neck and gripping tight. His naked body trapping her against the rough texture of the bed. Bearing down on her with his incisors made to rip straight through her throat.

Anger, righteous fury, has morphed the strangers pleasantly features into a twist of ugly things. His shiny auburn hair tousled in a way only a fight can bring. His brown eyes flashing in dangerous warning. The smell of his ire flooding against her face like hot rotted air.

This, she thinks as she sinks her nails into the flesh of his meaty shoulders, is exactly what her nature had intended to avoid.

This, she thinks, as she kicks and scrabbles for purchase, is the reason she doesn't take Alphas as clients.

This, she thinks as she feels him wedge himself between her flailing legs, is the main reason why she hates who she is because her mouth tends to get her into shit like this.

“Stop fighting me!” the stranger yells at her, his lips barely able to close over the. With a rough shake that makes her own sharp canines snap against her tongue and cause it to bleed, she stills. Her wild eyes meeting his in a show of defiance.

“Get off of me you piece of shit,” she hisses, refusing to cow when he growls low and vicious onto her face.

“No, I paid for you, now I'm gonna get what I paid for,” he bites out, his hand crushing down on her throat with a cruel amount of strength and power.

Barely able to breath she manages a growl of her own, enough of one to make her sound like a pissed off Beta rather than a pinned down Omega. Desperately, she fights against him, the fear building up within her chest.

Memories of a time she has willed herself to forget begin to flood her mind. Of eyes like chocolate and a smile like a razors edge. Of a scent that once smelled of home but now is always synonymous to pain and bloodshed.

She fights, fights as she always has, with teeth, knuckles, kicks and nails. She fights against this stranger with all the strength she has, but, there is none to be found. Not anything real, after all, she hasn't eaten in so long, hasn't slept right or taken care of herself as she ought to have. Especially now, that she's hopped up on suppressors since her heats coming on sometime soon.

But in the end, all she accomplishes is a few good punches, some half ass knee blows and scratches to the mans face. All this does is ensure that the John gets angry enough to land a few blows to her own face and some to her ribs. It prolongs the inevitable…

When the blunt end of his assailing limb forces it's way back into her, he growls out in sick satisfaction, “Like I said, _I'm_ fucking _you_.”

**~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~**

Memories of her childhood are always tinged in an amber tone, sepia almost. Color removed and distorted by the haze of anxiousness, fear and hunger. But, most often than not, by Pain. Faces, people, and places swirled deeper shades of copper by her mothers unstable state and the havoc she wrecked.

Even back before she presented as the dreaded O, her home had never been a happy one. Her mother Sara, the Alpha, had herself come from a rough life. A life where she was raised by fists and fists alone. So Sara had grown up tough and mean—like any good Alpha in her neighborhood ought to have. Whatever nurturing nature she might have had, was killed under the reign of her grandfathers roughened fists and her grandmothers indifference. But still, when it rains it poured when it came to the shitty lucky of her family.

Because, maybe, after so many years standing on her own, maybe her mother would have been alright. Maybe, after she found a place for herself in the muck and the grime she would have raised her baby semi-alright. But, then there came that flood. Baby blue's they call them, what her mother had gotten after giving birth. (Something that happened more often than the media liked to say it did, to Alpha women that gave birth.)

Usually, there's treatment for it. Hospitals don't like sending an Alpha woman home unstable because that's how you wind up hearing about the baby in the bath tub or the gammas with the missing windpipes because they stood too close. But her Momma hadn't had her in the hospital; it was in the back of a stolen minivan where Lela had thrown her first garbled shout of life. So her mother hadn't gotten any treatment. She hadn't gotten any medication. She sure as shit hadn't gotten any help.

So when she feels particularly nostalgic and lingers on memories of the past, it is often blurs of pain that she encounters. Anxiety and Fear being the chiefest of emotions she harbored as she ducked under their over thrown table to avoid her mothers flailing limbs. Hunger and Fatigue causing her stomach to gnaw at her own body as she sat in a dark kitchen wondering why her mother hadn't bothered to restock the fridge in over two months.

Sepia seems like the proper tone that exposes, in ugly detail, her mothers many addictions. Her mothers random bouts of madness and unadulterated rage swirling away whatever had been hued with tinges of life. So, thinking back on it, blaming it on the fact that she's that ever dreaded dynamic for all that has ever gone wrong in her life—feels like a bit of a cop out.

Of course, being that fucking O never did help any. But her troubles started long before she presented. Still, sepia seems to be the only light in which she can recall things from that long ago. She can't rightly remember the proper shade of her mothers eyes, skin or hair. Or what color their home had been back before the paint had flaked off.

And she only ever thinks of this when she's doped up on her suppressants. Because, as their name implies, the drugs suppress things. They take away the whole and leave mild impressions of what is there and what should have been. When she's on them she feels likes she's walking through a particularly thick gray fog that sucks the life and color out of everything. It reminds of her childhood and the memories she harbors in her head.

(More so now that she is nothing more than a massive ball of conscious pain.)

But what she clutches in her hand seems to be the only thing unaffected by that strange pull of the drugs. A white, pristine and crisp, card sits in her hand. The elegant scrawl of Pepper's handwriting standing out starkly against the little card. Her number is printed over the top, as well as her full name, but nothing else. What Pepper has written over the back empty space is her personal number. A number, Lela has a sneaky suspicion, that is not usually so casually and freely given. The fact that Lela grips it—as tight as only someone in pain can clutch—in her dirty hand makes something in her stomach roll.

The grime on her fingers are rubbing off on the white of the card. Mucking it up, tainting it, Lela is tainting it. Tainting the white that came from Pepper. Everything in her wants to toss it away from herself. Make it go away so that she can no longer ruin it. Everything in her makes her want to rid Pepper of her only tie to Lela. Because people like Pepper, people like Pepper, didn't need to be rubbing their shoulders with people like Lela.

Still, Lela finds one of her many faults to be that of selfishness. She is in need now, as she had not been then, at the restaurant with the Golden Goddess. Now, she is in desperate need for something— _help_.

There's pain with every breath she manages to pull deep enough into her lungs so that she doesn't pass out. Pain that makes it feel as if she's got knives sticking into her ribs. There's pain in every step she takes too. Pain on her thighs from the rings of bruises she's got there. Pain on her neck every times she swallows where he choked her enough to make her pass out. Pain on the bites that litter her breasts and chest where teeth drew blood. Pain on her busted lips and swollen eye. Pain on the welts where leather belt met flesh.

Pain in her womanly core from where he knotted and ripped himself in and out simply to be cruel.

She is a massive ball of pain.

But, her mother's voice is ever present as she walks down the midday sunlit sidewalk of uptown New York. A voice that demands she not cower even after she has been laid as low as she has. A voice that demands she square her shoulders even if it pulls at the scabs and makes fire lick down her spine. A voice that demands she lift her bruised chin and hold her head high even if it brings her more scandalized stares than she's comfortable with.

The building she walks to is like nothing she's ever known before. A building made of silver steel and shining blue windows. A building reeking of money and so much sophistication it damn near blinded her. A building whose address had been beautifully scrawled across the back of a pristine white card by a drop dead beautiful blonde all those months ago.

She had been sorely tempted, after leaving the restaurant, to call Pepper and tell her yes—fuck yes. She wanted so badly to pick up the phone and practically beg the blonde to please help her out of this life. But she hadn't.

A healthy amount of Guilt and Paranoia had stayed her hand. Kept her from lifting the phone to dial the number and speak to the goddess in the white tee.

She had, though, on occasion—when the temptation became too much—found herself walking past this building in the wee hours of the night. Taking in the magnificence of a place so utterly out of her reach it was staggering. After a while, the temptation faded away to cold and bitter reality. That day in the restaurant had been a dream, a fantasy and a one off. She should have taken the help then and there. Not now, not after so long.

So she carefully buried the card amongst the vials of her suppressors and forced herself to accept the disaster that was her life.

Until…

Until last night, when that John had gone above and beyond what the local grimy clinics were willing to patch up. Until, he saw to it—with brutal calculation—that she be wrecked entirely.

She'd gone, of course, to the free clinic down the more broken parts of Harlem. Was ushered back into an available room for the extent of blood on her face was a gruesome sight indeed. But the moment they began to pull out forms asking about dynamics, asking for legal names and talking about admitting her to a proper hospital—she left.

Most of it she can deal with on her own. She knows how to reset her broken nose well enough—did that on the bus ride to the swanky building. She can clean up an Alpha bite just fine and even stitch it up if need be. But what she can't do is judge honestly and correctly about the damage done to her nethers. She needs a doctor in a fancy white coat to tell her that. She needs a doctor to stem the bleeding, at least for a little while, just enough so that she can run to her motel room and take her Suppressors and Hbs.

But, she knows for a fact that doctor's will no doubt stick their nose where it doesn't belong. He's gonna wanna know about dynamics, he's gonna wanna know a real name and medical history will be looked up. And she'd rather let that beast slumber for as long as she can.

Quickly, she makes her way through the small crowd gathered out front. Dignified suit wearing people—the kind found on the cover of magazines and shit—flashing her the old 'double take' as if they can hardly believe someone like her—and in her state—is walking over to the same building they are. She ignores it as best she can because there's a sense of urgency in her steps. She needs to deal with as fast as humanly possible because everyone knows that Suppressors and Hormone Blockers only help so much. They're meant to cloak and distort the reality of what she is. It does not erase all the natural clues that lay hidden just underneath the fragile shield of her flesh. The longer she bleeds. The more she stays broken and twisted, the longer someone—anyone—can scent her for what she is.

So fear and anxiety run like rabid dogs through her veins as she climbs the clean steps up into the building. Her eyes focused on nothing more than the glass doors that open automatically. She ignores them in favor for the effort and concentration it takes to put one foot in front of the other when the pain between her legs makes her want to crumble to her knees. She cannot stop and apologize to the people she shoulders past lest they smell her fear and dynamic as she runs.

She needs to find Pepper, ask her— _beg her_ , to help. She needs help—at least something to stop the bleeding. Long enough until she can take something to hide it again.

And she almost makes it, doesn't waiver a moment, until an arm almost as big as that John's had been, wraps itself tight around the abused flesh of her upper arm and yanks her to a halt.

“I think you're a bit lost here, kid,” says the man dressed in a dark tactical uniform. There's no name badge or emblem that states he's a cop, but, there's a certain air about him that screams authority even when the man isn't trying to.

His hard tone and stale Alpha scent make everything in her want to cringe up and submit. The battered nature of her true self too pained and scared to want to fight. Wanting less abuse it's wish is for her to bare her neck in an attempt to please this new Alpha.

But, she grits her teeth and forces out a feral growl out from the back of her throat. Yanking her arm out of his grasp she spits out, “I think you should keep your fucking paws to yourself.”

“Look ma'am—” he starts only to trail off as his wide eyes take in the battered shape of her face and slowly he steps back, his back rigid and posture poised for a fight. Whatever training he has shows clear in the way his hand slips down to his waist to a black holster that carries a weapon of sorts.

“Ma'am I'm going to need you to come with me, you need medical attention, alright?” he tells her. His Alpha scent rearing up and out in a clear attempt to subdue her by nature alone. But his Alpha scent is—in all reality—more nerve grating than anything. He smells artificial. The musk he carries smells like it's come off a can—he smells fake and it makes her want to barf.

 _No shit_ , she wants to bark at him. But out of the corner of her eye, she can spot three more men show up dressed exactly as the first. All of them slowly but surely surrounding her to… she doesn't know. It makes her feel like a trapped animal, her hind-brain screaming at her to curl up tight and just fucking submit. But, she's a bit of a self abuser herself, and all this fear clogging up her mind brings out the worst in her.

Blood stained canines are dropped down low and bared. Her head is then tipped down so that no inch of her black and blue neck will show in this fight. She ignores the pain and embraces the adrenaline slowly firing it's way down her taut limbs.

She's two seconds away from lunging at somebody when she hears a sharp bark break the tension strained silence she's caused. Allowing her eyes to stray from the predators at her front, she searches for the source of that Gamma Bark. For only a Gamma could ever hit such placid notes. Notes meant to sooth Alpha's in a Rage, garner the trust of Betas and call to arms their own Gamma kin. And find the source she does, in the form of a strange looking brunette.

Dressed in a simple buttoned up navy shirt, brown corduroy pants, and large thick rimmed glasses, he is the very picture of Gamma elegance. His dark brown curls a wild mass atop his head sway as he all but runs towards the gathered group. His Barks, so smooth—like spilling water from a running river—echoing as he makes his way.

“S-Stop!” the man half stutters out, his eyes running over the scene in what looked to be surprise as he took it all in, “What's going on?”

“Sir, a level 2 aggressor has been spotted,” the first Alpha, the one who tried to man handle her, declares to the brown haired Gamma. His tone hard and clinical as he continued to watch her with a heavy sense of weariness.

“Ma'am,” the Gamma called to her, his gentle voice pulling at the frantic fear welling in her chest. So soothing his voice was that it almost made her sob.

“Ma'am, you need medical attention,” the gamma tells her, his eyes—hidden behind his large glasses—searching her face, “You need to come with me—”

Handsy Alpha interrupts the gamma then, a bark ripping out of him as he declares, “She must be taken in sir, she could be a threat.”

“Look at her!” the Gamma all but shouts, his bronze skin flushing red a shade as he growled out, “she's a kid! She needs to see a doctor not get thrown in some detention room!”

Detention room…

The words ring in her ear. They make her heart beat faster and the fear she's been feeling since first she walked out of that motel room skyrockets then. The thought of being locked away, long enough for her true scent to seep out in the form of crimson liquid and saturate a room, makes a savage like growl rip from her throat. Growling in a way only a feral dog can, she grips tight on the strap of her bag as she searches for an exit.

It had been a mistake coming here, looking for help. She should have known better. People like her, people like Lela, they didn't belong here. Look at them, they wouldn't even let her past the front door. They didn't even know the truth of what she was and already—just from looking at her—they deemed her a low parasite not fit for a place like this.

Growling, spitting out growls worthy of dive bar rumbles, she spots the exit she so desperately needs. Just past the third and forth uniformed dick that magically appeared, she spots a side exit. There's an opening between three and four, just big enough that if she moves fast, she should be able to take.

And take it she tries. She lunges, throws her small body between them, summon up what little energy and strength she has stored in her into the leap it takes to push through them. She almost makes it, her booted feet hitting hard against the polished black marble floor—jarring her entire body and injuries. There's a growing tension in her stomach as she rushes towards the automatic doors. A great sense of fear fueled excitement that she's about to make. The doors swing upon easily and her foot just barely makes out the threshold when suddenly…pain.

Pain like fire, pain like white hellish lightening, slams into her body at the exact moment that something impales itself into her upper left shoulder.

She drops like a sad sack of rotten potatoes. Her muscles drawn tight, ripping self made stitches open, she writhes on the ground in horrid pain. She can taste copper running down her throat as her teeth snap down on the sides of her cheeks.

When suddenly it ends, her lids are half open and staring at nothing but black combat boots, she thinks—this was yet another shit decision she's made.

Darkness swallows her whole.

 

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**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So first things first, SOOOOOOOO sorry it took so long to post. But life....life sucks.  
> Anywho, I hope you guys enjoy, I'm sorry if it feels wonky, but it felt strange writing Lela for some reason.   
> Leave comments, suggestions and the like down below.  
> Hope you all enjoy.


	10. Chapter 10 - Dealing with the Lobby Incident

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Head of Security must deal with the officer who made a mess in the lobby.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So before you read, just know, I know absolutely nothing about military ranks or anything remotely strategic. I tried to come up with what you'd call the main guy in charge of a squadron and I just sat here like this 0_0. I tried to google it but even google was looking at me like 'Girl...wtf you on about?'
> 
>  
> 
> Hope you guys can ignore it best you can and enjoy this tiny little snippet.

 

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Officer Randell Teems was a relatively average looking man. There wasn’t anything about his countenance might scream attractiveness or lack thereof. In fact, he was quite plain faced and homely even. His marks in his file were a reflection of that too. He was neither the top of his class nor the bottom of it. He was snugly pressed between the average employees at the Tower.

Still, there was something about his dark eyes that screamed untrustworthy. Despite the fact that his papers were squeaky clean, his file impeccable, there was an air of maliciousness about him. Officer Randell Teems, a war vet, an Alpha, a past police officer and current LP at the forefront of the Towers entrance.

Something about the man just rubbed him the wrong way. But he buries it under the guise of professionalism. The incident in the lobby, the one with a Taser and the Kid, having been seen by half the gathered mass was all anyone in the tower could talk about. He needed to get the facts straightened out before the Head Honcho’s deigned it fit to stick their pretty little noses into it and make it an even bigger mess.

“Can someone explain to me what exactly happened out there today?” comes the cool and calm collected voice of the Head of Security, Happy Hogan

“There was a level 2 aggressor, sir,” Teems tells him. His eyes locked somewhere between Happy’s brows and meeting Happy’s own gaze.

Quirking a dark brow in mild surprise, Happy glances down to the state of the art tech his boss has lined his desk with and stares at the footage being played in a silent loop.

There he sees the tiny image of a young girl dressed head to toe in baggy clothes colored n various hues of black. He can see, with the great aid of the insane quality of the camera’s positioned just about everywhere, in complete detail the face of this young girl. He can see her large dark brown eyes. He can see the delicate—barely there—up sweep of her pixie like nose. He can make out the dark tinge of her dark brown lips.

He can see, with startling quality, the utter wreck the girl is. Her dark hair, barely brushing her shoulders, is matted and tangled in dried blood. He can see the angry red bruising of her right brow creeping down to swell the edge of her eye. He can see the dried blood on her broken nose. He can even make out the two splits on her upper and bottom busted lips. He can see, when she whips her head about, the devilish lines across her neck and recognize the lines of fingers.

The image she presents is an ugly one. One seeped in blood and clear abuse. It enough of a sight to roll Happy’s stomach. It’s clear to anyone with a set of eyes what the girl is and it is no ‘aggressor’. Anger laces his veins as he turns his attention to the man before him.

“This civilian was the one you deemed a level 2 aggressor?” Happy questions as he flicked the rolling footage from his computer desktop onto the wall screen with a rough motion of his wrist.

Without issue the footage begins to run upon the giant wall. A wall that had previously been the same deep navy blue matted color as it’s three brothers. (Just another fancy upgrade from the Head Honcho’s.)

Nodding his head Officer Teems informs him without so much as glancing at the rolling footage, “I had reason to suspect she was armed and dangerous, Sir.”

“And why is that?” Happy asks him as he stares at the footage of a battered youth being steadily outnumber and encircled. The blood dripping from her lip spilling onto the smooth gray tiles of the Lobby floor.

“Sir, she was dressed in multiple layers which gave me the impression she might be hiding something in her clothes. She was also bleeding and smelling still of… _rage_ , I didn’t want to risk it sir,” Teems tells him.

“So, you saw baggy clothes and immediately thought, what? Gun? You saw blood on her face, cuts open and the smell of anger and you thought she needed to be forcibly subdued?” Happy demands, his voice raising in his ire.

“Sir,” at this Officer finally meets Happy’s eyes, his expression hard and cold, “She smelled used and dirty. I know that smell sir. She’s a hooker. She had no business in here.”

Happy nods slowly as he pinches his lips together. His gaze wanders from the Officer over to the wall. His eyes silently taking in the tiny little thing in black. He watches—furiously—as his men surround her. He watches as he dips her head down and growls. An Alpha’s form if ever he saw one. He watches the flash of her teeth—sharp lethal little things that resemble the gleam of sharpened bones—and takes in the pure wrath that seems to now be pouring off her trembling form. He watches the wild desperation marring her features, pulling at the cuts and the way she looks for any form of escape.

Happy watches until he cannot. The sight of her tiny body writhing in agony, staining the floor in crimson, an ugly thing he cannot do a fifth time today.

“You can go now, pack your things and get the hell out of this building. From today onward your services are no longer required here at Stark Industries,” Happy tells to the room as a whole. His hands busying themselves with the papers upon his desk.

“Are you firing me?!” Teems sputters in disbelief, “You can’t fire me! I didn’t do anything wrong!”

“I can, I did and no you most definitely did do something wrong. You tased a bleeding girl because you deemed her unworthy to help. That kind of attitude isn’t tolerated here,” Happy informs him in a stern tone. His eyes hard as steel as he glares the younger man down, “You acted disgracefully and I don’t employee shit bags like you.”

“You don’t employ me,” Teems all but sneers at him. His brown eyes looking down at Happy in a way only self-entitled pricks can manage, “I work for Stark Industries. You’re nothing but a glorified chauffer. You can’t fire me. Only Stark can,” and as if he wasn’t already skating on melting ice, Teems leans ever closer so that Happy may hear him without obstruction, he mutters with dripping acidic disdain, “ _Gamma_.”

With a purse of his thin lips, Happy stands from his desk and looks upon the young face of this man. This Alpha who, taking from the way he is currently pulling Dynamic Rank, is an utter douchebag brought forth from the hate breeding homes of Traditionalists. He stares at this young man’s face and sees in his unguarded gaze all that Happy hates.

Happy now knows why the man rubbed him the wrong way all this time.

Issuing not a single word, Happy’s hand goes flying out towards Teems. Happy Hogan is the first to admit it, but, his round belly and husky build hardly inspire fear in his opponents. For all instances and purposes, he looks exactly what he is: a middle-aged man. His 5’8 height coupled with his—considerably—hefty weight makes for a homey image. The idea that he can be dangerous is almost laughable.

Most of the time Happy doesn’t mind the underestimating looks his physique garners. He thinks nothing of it, most of the time. Ignores it best he can and simply smiles when people make the assumption that he’s just a big old softie.

What Happy won’t and will hear nothing about is his Dynamic. He was born a Gamma. Which automatically means, in everyone’s heads, that he just won’t ever match the strength of Betas or Alphas. He was a Gamma which meant when people looked at him and the position he held they thought it was pity or sympathy that helped launch him here.

But, Happy is dangerous. His soft countenance aside and despite his ‘lesser’ dynamic. Happy was a dangerous man especially when he was angered.

Gripping tight onto the front of Teems’ shirt Happy all but drags him across his desk. Paper and pens going flying in the tussle.

With a growl that was all danger and lethal anger, Happy tells the deluded Alpha, “I hired you, you little fuck, so I can fire you. Now, you get the fuck out of my tower before I spill your goddamn neck.”

Shoving the man away, Happy presses his com which allows the guards of this sector to come filing in. Officer Brodes steps readily up to his desk. Her green eyes meeting his gaze steadily as she awaits her orders.

“Get this self-indulgent prick out of my office. Mr. Teems is no longer employed by Starks industries and if he is found on the premises without my explicit directions I want him tased on sight,” Happy informs Officer Brodes.

Nodding, Brodes takes hold of Teems’ left upper arm, intending to pull him out of the room. But Teems, the ass, shakes her off in a rough shake, his gaze burning as he glares at Happy, “You’ll regret this you fat fuck! You can’t just fire me like this over some stupid whore!”

When Brodes goes to hold him again, Teems growls and snaps his teeth at her, his anger turning on her, “You keep your filthy fucking hands off me you Beta-Bitch! I’m an Alpha you can’t touch me like that!”

Without issuing so much as a flinch, Brodes turns to Happy and asks, “Sir, Teems seems to be unwilling to cooperate civilly, may we use force to subdue him and escort him from the tower?”

“By all means,” Happy tells her with a smile.

If Teems leaves with a broken nose and a split lip, Happy has no idea where or how he garnered those injuries. But, he makes sure to smile widely at Brodes when next he sees her in the lunch room.

 

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**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So who else thought this update was going to be about Happy?  
> No one?  
> Yeah...me either.  
> I started writing an update through Lela's POV. but it felt wrong to just skip over to her when I clearly needed to deal with that asshole and his taser.   
> Next update should be up soon, hopefully through Lela's POV. But, I don't know guys, this thing has a mind of its own.
> 
>  
> 
> as always, I would love to hear from those of you guys who are still reading.  
> with love,  
> Ani


	11. A Doctor and a Business Woman's POV

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A quick update where we peek into the head of a doctor and an old friend learns of Lena's whereabouts.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So quick apology before you start, I did not--like at all--edit this chapter or even give it the old second glance. So there are mistakes in there and I apologize for it. But, it's in the editing stage that I tend to keep these things forever and a day. And editing, well, it brings out the worst in me where I'll just delete everything I wrote because I grow to hate it.
> 
> So I'm sorry if things are misspelled or the grammars wrong, or the sentences somewhere are choppy. But I'd rather give you this now than risk not handing it over at all.

 

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Since the incident, there are times in which he thinks the only thing he is capable of feeling is Rage.

Bright hot, bitter and volcanic Rage.

The kind that can break worlds, tear flesh and spill blood. Rage that makes a monster out of him. Rage that only ever seems to feed the… _Other Guy_. Rage that runs easily enough in his veins you’d think his heart would just give out under the added strain of it all.

Rage…

It fills him good and plenty, but, it isn’t the only thing he feels.

These days there is more than a sliver of happiness rumbling about in him. Happiness found in the Tower. Happiness found among like-minded individuals that understand—if only a smidgen—the heavy burden he must carry for the rest of his days. Happiness found in his lab hidden away from those who do not understand. Happiness because he’s found friends.

Still, some days are better than others there are days where he locks himself away and avoids people for fear of what he might do. There are days when the memories of what he has done, in both his tawny skin or forest green, flood him and he can do little more than fall into a self-imposed trance to keep the beast at bay.

But the moments that spur a transformation are few and far in between since he took up Tony’s offer to come live in the tower. Of course, he’d initially hadn’t wanted to because their relationship—the one between himself and Tony—wasn’t on the best of terms. Not since the Accords. Not since the sordid ‘Civil War’. Not since Tony had built a near impenetrable room and allowed that Colonel to usher him in by the front end of a high-powered rifle.

Things between Stark and himself were rocky at best.

When the offer had been made he’d thought of several ways to tell the Billionaire where exactly he could shove it. The Other Guy had thought of several ways to painfully make the dark-haired man’s death a bloody and gruesome one. (After all, Tony hadn’t just betrayed him, the Big Guy had felt it too. The trust placed in the Funny Man broken.) Tony’s Accords incident hadn’t just muddled up friendship when it came to Bruce. He had, after all, offered something more significantly more important.

Just thinking about it made his chest ache with the phantom howls of lament.

But, damn if Bruce wasn’t a sucker for sad brown eyes.

All it took was Tony to look at him, heartbroken and miserable, and Bruce had bent. He hadn’t accepted that half assed apology wrangled out of the suit wearing man at the behest of Pepper’s pointed glares and growls. But, the offer to live, work and be snuggly at peace in the confines of Stark’s state of the art Tower? That he had accepted with little more than a sour grimace and a nod of his head.

It still didn’t make him and Tony okay. In fact, Bruce hadn’t had a proper conversation with the man since last he crashed Bruce’s lab and broke a vitally important piece to Bruce’s work. Bruce had promptly banned the man from ever entering his work space and even went so far to take up the issue with Pepper. Because everyone knew, if there was anyone who could properly reign in Tony’s shenanigans it was Ms. Pepper Potts.

The woman was a tyrant of industries and she didn’t take any shit from anyone. Least of all her Alpha.

But, since living in the Tower, even though he had to deal with catching whiffs of Tony’s utterly unique scent everywhere he went, Bruce has found more moments in which Rage is superseded by other normal emotions. Though he’d never admit as much to Tony and would rather have his entire work journal burned if ever asked to admit it aloud, he’s thankful the man has granted him asylum here.

But that’s beside the point here.

The point is, that these days, there is rarely a cause for the Other Guy to really get riled up. The Other guy is easily manageable now where he had not been before. (Bruce likes to think it’s because of the sense of security that surrounds him these days. Of that paranoid fear of being caught, of being taken in to some nameless facility and being hurt having all but dissipated. Bruce likes to think it is because he now has a home that the Other Guy finds some form of comfort and keeps his peace for the sake of it.) Point is, these days the Other Guy is but throbbing headache of pent up energy.

Today, was no such day.

Today, after the incident in the lobby, the Other Guy is revved up and ready for a fight. The image of the girl, bloody and barely standing, having woken the sleeping green giant. The image of her face, bloody, black and blue, having made the Big Guy utterly and inexplicitly angry. The smell of her pain, of her distress, was bitter like vinegar and something distinctly sulfuric, had been enough to make his duller Gamma fangs ache and drop. His instincts, nurturing and caregiving went to war with those of the Green Man’s who held onto feelings of bloodlust and visions of battle.

Having stood there and witnessed the utter disregard of protocol as a battered young girl was tased till she passed out. The Big Guy was rumbling just underneath his skin. Itching and scratching to be released. To reign terror upon nameless faces and cause the very earth to tremble in his wrath. The Big Guy is growling out words that sound like _revenge_ , like _vengeance_ , like _blood for blood_. The Big Guy wants to follow the trail of blood out of the building and find the source of those bruises. The Other Guy wants to break bone for bone and not stop.

And not for the first time does Bruce sit here and completely, whole heartedly agree.

Bruce knows though, that he shouldn’t be agreeing with the Green Beast. He knows better than to fan the other man’s fires. But it’s hard not to. When the memories of his mother’s sobs had swallowed whole the entirety of his childhood. It’s hard not to when he remembers what it was like hiding underneath the kitchen table as his father had roared his Alpha rage. It was hard not to agree with the Big Guy when he remembers what it was like to be turned away because his face was to bruised, his dynamic lesser, and he was deemed a casualty and not worth helping. It’s hard not to when he’s sitting where he’s sitting.

The girl, nameless for she had carried nothing on her by way of identification, lies motionless on the black cushioned medical bed. The third largest room in the Medical Wing is where he carried her unconscious body. Ignoring protocols and policies in place, implemented post-SHIELD days, he had not scanned her face, retina, or fingerprints in an effort to figure out who she was and where she came from. He had simply taken her up here, asked Jarvis to label the room a priority and off limits to anyone not cleared explicitly by Bruce, and just sat here waiting for her to wake.

But he was not about to do the rest of it. Not specifically to spite Tony’s damn rules. But because, there were some lines that Bruce would never cross at the behest of Tony. Because Ultron hadn’t worked out well for any of those involved.

So, he goes to task, Bruce, and does what he can without crossing consent lines. He checks that the taser hasn’t gone and fucked up her heart with a stethoscope—no fancy wand/hologram thing Tony insists upon—and checks her eye’s response to light. He cleans up the girls face of dried blood and places butterfly bandages where he can. When he is done he sits back in a chair provided and waits.

Waits for the girl to wake. Waits to ask her about the blood on her jeans. Waits to help her reset the bone in her nose. Waits to ask if he can do a full exam with her permission. Waits to ask her if she needs help. Waits to ask how the girl managed to get the private number of Pepper. He sits and waits in a clinical room and grips the bloodied card in his hand all the while wrangling the beast within him.

 

* * *

 

 

“So, have you thought it over yet?” Happy grumbles from where he sits across from her desk. His face is worn and tired, like maybe he hasn’t gotten proper rest in quite some time.

Flicking her eyes away, she goes back to the mounds of paperwork set before her and continues signing her name, “Thought over what?”

“Firing all the human personnel and replacing them with whatever tinker bots Tony has puttering around down in his private labs,” he responses with an exasperated huff of air.

A light smile graces her lips as she continues to sign, “We’ve talked about this Happy, I cannot in good judgment screw with the economy simply because you don’t have proper social skills. Or dislike people on ‘instincts’ alone.”

“My social skills are excellent, thank you very much. And you can’t dismiss my ‘Douche Radar’ anymore! Not after today,” He tells her carelessly as he fiddles with his tablet. His eyes running over the security grid all happily in the green and not blinking that nasty ugly red.

Now that stills her working hands and forces her to straighten up in her chair. Carefully, she puts down her pen and probes easily, “Did something happen today?”

“Huh?” Happy grumbles, lazily lifting his head and staring at his boss.

“Did something happen today?” she repeats.

“Well, yeah, in the morning. You didn’t hear?” Happy questions her, his brows pinched as he had figured—since it was the talk of the entire Tower—that she might have been the first to know.

“I was in a meeting with the representatives of CHNR—” she tells him before he interrupts.

“CHNR?”

“The official bureau of China’s Natural Resources,” she clarifies.

“Ah,” He exclaims softly, “I thought Tony was in charge of that ‘Green Planet’ thing?”

“It’s ‘Green Globe’ actually, and yes he _was_ in charge of it. Before Iron Man was needed off the coast of France for something or the other.” She informs him before repeating herself yet again, “So what happened this morning that would solidify the fact that Mechanical Servants would better serve us, at the risk of plunging half of New York into poverty, then Human Personnel.”

“Well, before I tell you, you should know that the situation has already been dealt with. I personally saw to it. The Officer that caused the incident has been fired and the girl—” Happy starts, his words coming out quick in his eagerness to settle her nerves before he’s enticed her anger.

“Happy,” she interrupts him this time around and waves away his attempts to continue on with his assurances, “Must’ve been some incident to warrant termination rather than a reprimand, just tell me.”

It must be something in her gaze or the years of managing Tony and all his nonsense that’s given her resting face a certain edge to it. A face that just says ‘cut the shit’ without actually trying. A face Happy, as well as actual world leaders, had a hard time denying that face a thing.

“Ex-employee Randell Teems committed an infraction this morning,” Happy informs her, his tone turning entirely professional at the sight of her no-nonsense expression, “He horribly misjudged a situation and overreacted. He used excessive force which inevitably resulted in the injury of an unarmed civilian on compound grounds.”

“Well, shit,” she exclaims with a growl while roughly running a hand down the left side of her face.

‘Just what we need now,’ she bitterly thought. Her mind already filling itself with all manner of lurid headlines and lawsuits.

“What happened?” she demands in a less than polite tone.

Shrugging his suit clad soldiers, Happy heaves a tired sigh, “Teems claimed he saw the unarmed civilian as a threat, tased her when she wouldn’t comply and maybe that’d be the end of it if it wasn’t for the worst of it.”

At her raised brow and tersely pursed lips, Happy continues after a breath, “The civilian can’t be much older than eighteen, honestly, maybe ninety pounds on a good day, and fuck the way she came in…I don’t know how to describe it! She looked like she just came in from war. Bloody from the top of her head to the ends of her toes! I don’t know what the hell she was doing in here. She should’ve been at a hospital.”

“And he tased her?!” she barks out in an utterly dominate note, “He tased a bloody, unarmed kid? What for?”

“Honestly?” Happy hedges, because the honest answer hadn’t made him like the incident any more than she probably will. At her stiff nod, he tells her, “Because the Teems claimed to know the smell of a hooker when he saw one. And as such, she was deemed ‘a nonperson’ to be dealt with rather than to be helped.”

“A _hooker_?” she repeats, a wriggling nagging cold feeling seeping into the pit of her stomach.

Again, Happy shrugs, “Yeah, that’s what he said. But, I don’t know, I don’t see it. Kids too young and even if she was, that’s no excuse. I wanted to beat him to a bloody pulp right there and then but…”

And as Happy continues ranting and raving she quietly peers down at her desktop. Fear makes her fingers tremble as she punches in her username and passcode. There’s swirling unease in her stomach tying it up into knots. She can feel the heavy thump of her rapidly beating heart. The taste of her own distress a tang on her own tongue.

There’s a bitter anxious feeling in her mind. One that tells her, she already knows the answer of the ugly questions she’s about to ask. But ask it she must. Silently she lets her fingers fly over the keyboard selfishly drawing out the time by doing this manually rather than having Jarvis pull it up for her. When she finds the flagged file with the necessary footage she allows the arrow to simply float over it. Fear freezing her as she stared at the back of a familiar figure.

With a heavy heart, she presses play and allows the events to unfold before her own eyes.

When the truth, that has sat in her since Happy relayed to her the broad strokes of it all, is finally confirmed she feels bile rise up into her throat. Abruptly she jumps to her feet, roughly pushing her desk away from herself and in turn causes several folders and objects to go tumbling down onto the floor.

“Whoa! What’s wrong? Are you feeling okay—” Happy questions quickly, already on his feet and at her elbow to steady her swaying form.

She tells him nothing as she pushes past him and heads out he office door. All but sprinting to the elevator, she ignores the frantic calls of Happy and even the startled queries of her secretary. Without needing to ask ahead an elevator is waiting for her with its door ajar. Tumbling in, she breathlessly calls to Jarvis, “Where is she, the girl from the lobby?”

“She is located in the Medical Wing Ma’am, in room 3B with Doctor Banner,” Jarvis tells her in that unflappable British lull of his.

“Take me to her?” she half begs, her Beta teeth shinning, her blue eyes welling, her chest rumbling in her whimpered distress calls.

“Of course, Ms. Potts,” Jarvis easily says as the elevator begins its descent.

 

* * *

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you enjoyed!  
> Thoughts?  
> Opinions?  
> Suggestions?
> 
> -Ani


	12. Unneeded Discomfort

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In the process of getting treated something goes wrong.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, I'm gunna be up front with you guys, I'm just going to start posting this story as it comes.  
> I'm tired of abandoning Fic's because my anxiety and depression get the best of me.  
> If I manage to bang out even half a chapter, I'm going to post it. So I'm sorry if the endings are a bit abrupt but I want to keep going for those of you who have stuck with me for as long as you have.
> 
> I hope you enjoy.
> 
> (Also, I think this might be graphic, but I don't know. And it will be glaringly apparent that I don't know shit about medical stuff. Sorry!)

 

* * *

 

 

At this point in her life, she’s lost track of how many times she’s been knocked back on her ass and laid utterly the fuck out. She knows, vaguely, that it’s somewhere in the double digits, though; the exact number escapes her.

Still, frequent flier she may be, but it still fucking sucked to get knocked out.

When she comes to it takes a moment for her brain to catch up to all the pain in her body. There’s a two or so second delay in which she thinks, with her eyes closed, that it might have all been some trippy dream. One caused by fatigue, hunger, and the drugs. But then, those three seconds are up.

The pain radiates from the center of her being and then outward. Flooding out of her in waves of hot blistering heat. She can feel every injury with startling clarity and by the gods it fucking blows. With the pain comes the recognition that, yes, it was very real and on the heels of that comes the utter dread that the jig might be up.

 _Detention center_ , the man in the tactical uniform had said. _Detention center_ , he had growled out even as she had backed away attempting to undo her error. _Detention center_ , was where they probably stuck her in.

 _Fuck_ , her mind whispers.

Fear and anxiety fight each other for dominance within her as she internally scrambles for strength. She doesn’t have any idea what she was going to do once she actually gets up. She doesn’t even know where she might be at the very moment. A detention center or a hospital, handcuffed to a railing awaiting a string of unanswerable questions. A detention room at the local police department?

Quickly, she fights with her lids, as they feel as heavy as lead and utterly uncooperative. They barely crack open a sliver before she’s screwing them shut with a groan of pain. The blinding white of the overhead lights were powerful enough to feel like needles in her orbs.

“T-Take it easy…” comes a voice suddenly, from her left, causing her to jerk upright.

Or, at least, attempt to.

Ignoring the disorientating waves of dizziness that comes spilling into her brain, she wrenches herself up off whatever comfortable thing she’s been laying on. Her vision is swimming but she forces her eyes to focus, at least, upon whomever has spoken. With a bit of a struggle she manages to catch sight of the speaker.

Brown messy curls, sprinkled lightly with gray, is what first she can make out. Brown messy tangles she has a feeling she’s seen somewhere before. Second to come is a soft blue dress shirt and a pair of brown corduroy pants. Third are those large, horn rimmed, thick bridged glasses. Fourth to come is the sound of that smooth Gamma rumble. The sound meant to calm, meant to disarm and comfort.

That sound, she blearily remembers, belonged to the only person who had been willingly to stand between the Alphas that had surrounded her. The Gamma who had defended her and offered his help without hesitance. A Gamma she cannot scent because of the overwhelming smell of sterile equipment.

“I wouldn’t…I wouldn’t recommend you move around so much,” the man tells her in a stuttered and flustered sentence. He’s standing to her left and nearly eye level with her from where she lays on some kind of cushioned medical slab.

“You should lay back down,” he states softly. His dark brows pinched as he stretches his hands outward towards her.

On hard instincts alone, she growls at him savagely. Her teeth are bared, her neck hidden, her fingers pointed like claws and her eyes screaming murder. The rough sound that spills from her throat would make a feral dog proud. There was no elegance in that growl, no petty show of dominance, or power. Only that she was a wild thing, a dirty street thing, and she wasn’t about to let a hand near her lest she bite those pretty fingers clean off. She’s in pain, so much pain she can barely stand it, and she doesn’t know where she is.

Or if they know yet.

“I’m—I…” the Gamma man starts, his mouth opening and closing as he attempts to search for the right words the situation called for. His dark eyes flashing as they raced over the expanse of her face, “I’m not going to hurt you, I just want to help.”

“Where am I?” she hisses, ignoring the flaring of pain in her side as she forced herself into a sitting position.

“You’re in the Medical wing of the Stark Industries,” the man informs her with a pinch furrowing deeper into his brow.

“That Alpha prick,” she growls, her eyes flashing about the room—a clean white and gray sterilized room, the kinds found only in hospitals or doctors’ offices—searching for the man with the taser, “he said something about a _detention center_.”

Confusion and then something like aggravation slips onto the Gamma man’s face—rage swelling bright and bitter in scent waves finally leaking out of him, “Officer _Teems_ has been dealt with, you don’t have to worry about him.”

“I’m not worried about him,” she half bites around her words as she swings her legs over the edge of the cushioned slab, “I just wanted to know if I was going to run into his bitch ass on my way out.”

“You’re leaving!” the Gamma exclaims in an incredulous shout. His brows climbing high into his hairline, “You can’t leave! You need medical attention!”

“No shit,” she snaps as she takes a steadying deep breath and allows her body to slip down and off the high raised table.

The landing, slow and soft as she had attempted to do it, leaves her breathless. The slight thump of her feet hitting tiled floor has pain flaring bright and loud in her body. Black spots in her vision arrive at the action of standing upright too. Her vaginal area is throbbing and pulsating in ways that only make her knees weak and her head swim.

“Look, I know things didn’t go so well when you first came in, but, let me help you! I’m a doctor!” The Gamma quickly argues. His tanned face flushed in his hurry to get her to lay back without ever actually putting his hands on her.

His hands, browned skinned and large, hover about her person but never dare to actually land anywhere. The man is, by no means, a large man but now as she’s standing she sees him wholly. He is of average height. His build is lean and nothing too muscular. There’s something utterly homely about his person. A soft and delicate aura to him only amplified by the scent he carries.

Now that she’s standing, and standing so close to him as she is, she can make it out. Like baked apple pie. He smells of sweet cinnamon and just a dash of paprika. It’s a scent that is inviting. He smells like a home might after a long day on the bitter cold streets. Warm and safe. It is unlike anything she’s ever smelled before.

“I shouldn’t have come here,” she tells him, her eyes wrenching themselves away from his flustered face. Quickly they search the room for her bag. There’s a rapid tap to her heart as her search comes up empty for the first two or three seconds. In that bag, that ratty black and torn back pack of hers, lies one of the six remaining vials of her suppressors. She needs that bag here and now because she doesn’t know how long she’s been knocked out. She needs that bag because she needs to dose herself up before everyone and their mothers figures out what she is on a passing sniff.

“Where’s my shit,” she growls out at the Gamma man.

“What—You mean your bag?” he fumbles as he turns completely around, baring his back to her without hesitation, and unearths her missing bag from a cabinet in the wall.

Before she can snatch the bag out of his extended hand, the Gamma man stills and fixes her with a firm stare, “Please don’t leave.”

His eyes, soft brown, warm and hidden mostly behind his glasses, hold such an honest expression she balks at the sight of it. Her body freezes and she struggles for a moment under that stare to find the proper curses to properly tell him to fuck off.

“I know I’m just a stranger to you, but, My name is Bruce Banner and I’m a doctor and all I want to do is help you. Let me just patch you up before you head back out,” he tells her.

Against her better judgement, with the smell of apple pie, cinnamon and paprika fucking with her brain, she nods her head in an ugly jerky motion. There’s something about that scent—so comforting, inviting and utterly sweet—that disarms her. Much like that Golden Goddesses’ had. It makes her want to curl up and just simply _be_. It makes her want to rest her head and leave the ugly habits she’s carved into her skin behind.

“No questions,” she tells him, her tone hard as steel.

Nodding his head, he gingerly pushes up the bridge of his glasses further up his nose, “If anything I do makes you feel uncomfortable I’ll stop and you can go, no questions asked.”

“No names, nothing on paper,” she continues on.

Again, he nods his head as he hands her that ratty black back pack, “I just want to help you, honest.”

With the arm loop in hand, the small weight of her bag pulling at the muscle in her battered arm, she nods her head, “Fine.”

Without another word, the Gamma man hands her a paper like green gown and ushers her behind a soft sheer medical partition that— _literally_ —pops out of the white wall. Carefully, she undresses and gathers her dirty, bloodied and stinking clothes into a neat pile. Her bag sits upon the entirety of it all.

Slowly, and with the Gamma man’s help, she finds herself back onto the gray cushioned medical table. They remain quiet, both her and the doctor, even as she is cleaned up. Her busted nose, that throbs and she cannot breathe through, is reset— _professionally_ this time around—with an ugly crunch. Her jaw is looked at, for the swelling on the left side of it looks to be tripling. The cuts on her head are cleaned of the glass that was embedded into them. The little gray tin cup on a little sterilized table filling itself almost half ways with green hued glass. They move on, soundlessly, to further injuries.

The Gamma, despite the initial nervous stuttering at the beginning, conducts himself in a manner she can only call: proficient. His hands do not tremble. His eyes do not waiver or linger for too long. His cool expression does not belie a thing. Even his scent is carefully managed.

For all the world, this Gamma carries on his doctoral duty of cleaning her up, like he’s always come across such carnage as this.

It is almost…admirable, she thinks.

The silence is only broken, when the Gamma speaks, his eyes are trained on the needle he is threading and not on her.

“Do you maybe…want documentation? Should you wish to report this.”

“No,” she half growls at him.

He doesn’t offer a comment, simply nods his head and tightens his lips. When the needle is threaded and the Alpha Bites at her shoulder and back sterilized, he goes to work. She can hardly feel the needle slip through her flesh at first. She can only focus her attention on keeping quiet, on not simpering, on not revealing the fact that she is so wildly hurting.

She could slip, in the middle of this all, reveal her stupid fucking secret when she’s gotten this far. So, she bites on the inside of her cheeks and trains her eyes on the off-white tile with patterns of swirls of gray ink in them.

When the welts on her back are bandaged up and the Bites properly sealed, he tells her in a tone that is nothing but soft and soothing, “You should lay back.”

In a rough movement, she turns to eye him. Her expression must be one of confusion and apprehension, for, he explains himself without her prompting.

“You need to be examined, the amount of blood you’ve lost can only indicate that the damage was extensive.”

She opens her mouth to speak, to tell him no, to tell him that this will be enough. Fear of being caught, of somehow being found out by some tiny physical difference in her vaginal area, whirling about her. What if he sees her and figures it out. What if that’s all it takes?

“You can say no, I won’t force you,” he interrupts her mental downward spiral. His expression so honest and sincere, “But, I cannot, in good conscious, allow you to leave without a brief examination, at least. Your injuries could be extensive and there is a high possibility rate that you could get an infection. I don’t want to frighten you but the mortality rate for something this serious is well up in the—”

 “Fine.” She interrupts him harshly.

Without a word, she lays back. Ignoring the burst of pain in her back and the blazing heat of discomfort in the pull of her newly acquired stitches. She lays back and awaits the Gamma man’s next moves. With a swish, stir-ups are almost magically conjured and attached to the table. Silently she and the Gamma man fixe her trembling legs upon them and her bottom is scooted down until it sits just at the edge of the table.

Her eyes fix themselves upon the smooth ceiling above her and does her damnedest to stifle every whimper building in her chest. She bites, savagely, upon her tongue when something unforgivingly cold is placed into her. She digs her nails into her palms when pressure is applied. She allows tears to spill sideways out of her eyes when it feels like something akin to pure fire has been tossed into her vagina.

“S-Stop!” she all but shouts, flying upwards into a sitting position.

There’s a cold sweat on her forehead and trickling down chest and spine. She wants to cry and beg the Gamma man to keep his fucking hands to himself and to let her up. His care so far was good enough. The fear of pain out weighing the thought of potential death.

“I’m sorry! I’m sorry!” the Gamma man exclaims; his brown eyes are wide behind his glasses. His gloved hands—crimson smeared—are out over his head as if she has pointed a gun at him.

“Stop, just… _stop_ ,” she growls out, her brows pinched and her lips trembling. She entertains the thought of maybe kicking him away and getting off the slab. She thinks about putting back on her clothes and booking it. She thinks it over in her head and dismisses it. Because, even if the Gamma man hadn’t told her, she knows just what can happen when injuries like this, to this extent, are left to fester.

She remembers a Beta Girl, Danielle or Daniela, and the brutal way she had been beaten and assaulted. She remembers how the Beta Girl had barely made it past four days before they found her dead in her motel room. Puss and other gross shit leaking out of her vagina.

She doesn’t want to die like that.

So, she grits her teeth and tells him after a while, “Sorry, it hurt.”

“Do you want something for the pain?” the Gamma Man asks her.

“No,” she firmly informs him.

Shock is written across his brow as he tells her, “I would advise for it. I need to continue on and I don’t wish to make you feel any unneeded discomfort.”

“Buddy,” she bitterly laughs before raking her hand through the right side of her hair—the only side not littered in stitches and staples, “My entire life is _unneeded discomfort_. But…”

And that’s when she feels it. Like a slow slide of liquid suddenly spilling out of her womanly center. Her head is suddenly top heavy and flops backwards as her words get lost on her tongue. She feels her heart slow and the images of the Gamma Man’s face slip in and out of her line of sight.

“Are you…”

She hears his voice echo somewhere far away.

Something like a loud and shrill alarm is going off in the distance.

The touch of a hand on her shoulder a faraway sensation as more of that liquid slide feeling comes spilling out of her.

The last thing she hears ringing in her ears as blackness falls on her is, “…she’s hemorrhaging…”

 

* * *

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please feel free to comment!  
> -Ani


	13. Old Bonds and Knights

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Does Lela make it out of surgery?!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning!  
> I did not EDIT!!!

****

* * *

 

Her breath is coming out in quick pants as if she’s just ran the entire length of New York, _twice_. In truth, she’s only run the small distance between the elevator and Medical room 3B. It’s a short run, one she can do without any problem considering all the training she’s been doing lately, still she’s out of breath. She blames it on the dread in her veins. Her hands tremble and she feels the length of her upper canines extending as she rushes to the room.

The smell of blood if thick in the air and she fights hard not to inhale it through her nose. And even if she inhales most of it in her mouth and not her nose, she _knows_.

The girls scent is a unique one; one that she can spot and name in a heartbeat. Even if their encounter had been less than a handful of hours. She remembers it clearly, can still taste it distinctly in the air around her. Her scent was made up of something bitter and hard edged like an aged whiskey or even like matches being struck to light. She also smelled of drying flowers something like flowers that had long since withered up and dead. Chiefly, though, she smelled strongest of cigarette smoke. Still, underneath all of that, there was something smooth and nearly sweet like. A true scent marker of who the girl was but it was hidden by the harshness of a hard life.

All of it, mixed together, was a scent that screamed Lela.

A scent that had, in the short time she had gotten to know the younger girl, burrowed itself underneath Pepper’s flesh. A scent her hind brain can conjure up without hesitation when she lays awake at night and worries over the caramel colored lady. A scent that made every nurturing, maternal, instinct rear up for a fight that was not present. A scent that scram of something familiar, of something strangely reminiscent of … _family_.

It was, is, a scent that makes her run faster because that scent isn’t the only thing in the air. She can smell blood. Too much blood.

“Madam Potts, it appears there was some complications with treating the Girls injuries. She has been transported to room E5.” Jarvis tells her suddenly.

Freezing so abruptly, that it is only by a miracle she doesn’t trip and fall, Pepper turns down another corridor and heads in the new direction, “What kind of complications?”

“It would be improper of me to relay the details in your current environment,” Jarvis announces to the whole of the corridor before silencing.

Dread drops like a heavy lead cannon ball into the pit of her stomach. But, she nods her head without another word and rushes forward. Idly, in her panic, she wonders if maybe she should call Tony. Her fears making it so that she needs the reassurance of a Pack Member. More importantly, her Pack Alpha.

She shoves the thought aside, roughly. A growl rumbling in her throat as something akin to anger paced up her spine. The force of her reaction at the mere thought of Tony, almost has her reeling back, because last she checked, everything between her and her Alpha were well and good. (Well, as good as they can be when he was a deliberate pain in the ass.) Still, they hadn’t had arguments as of late that would warrant such a response from her. Analyzing the reason behind such a random emotion flies right out of her head the moment she catches sight of a familiar head of chocolate curls.

“Bruce!” she calls out before she’s even ten feet before him.

In a flash, Bruce turns to take her in and in turn she is able to drink in the sight of him. What she sees makes her blood run cold.

The blue of his dress shirt is drenched nearly black with the amount of blood. The soft brown shade of his pants too is covered in that mess. His face is tight with emotion as he turns to look at Pepper skid to a halt before him. His eyes unreadable behind those too large glasses. The scent of his distress, his anger, his sadness, his frustration and failure a thick and cloying scent in the air. (Like rotted lemons.)

“What happened?” she croaks out in a breathless voice.

“There was…she uh—” Bruce begins only to teeter off, his hands roughly raking their way through his messy curls, “I was just…there was so much blood, I…”

Pepper knows by heart the protocols in place for a number of situations involving Bruce, and in turn the Hulk. She knows that by all right and reason, he is the first to be removed out of stress inducing or anger enticing situations. She knows Bruce is the last person someone is to be hostile with. She knows, that if Bruce needed to be involved with something, it meant there had to be a pitcher of Rose Tea around. Pepper ignores all these protocols and all but shakes Banner by his shoulder to get him to focus.

“The girl from the Lobby incident, she was with you,” Pepper tells him, her poppy blue eyes boring into his dark scattered eyes.

Nodding his head, he stutters, “Uh, y-yeah, I…I brought her in to be examined. I was dressing her injuries.”

“Jarvis said she was moved here to E5 after complications,” Pepper clarifies and then demands, “Why? What happened?”

removing his glasses, Bruce pulls away from Pepper and finds one of the metal chair that lined the Emergency Treatment corridor. He falls into with all the grace of a shot bull. His body falling with the weight of his weariness and with all the aid of gravity.

“That girl…” Bruce says to the tile floor, his head bowed and refusing to meet Peppers gaze, “That girl was brutalized. I just wanted to help her. I could smell the blood and the beginning of an infection. I talked her into letting me treat her and then she could leave. No questions asked.”

“But I must’ve reopened a wound. I must’ve torn something in her when I was checking. She started to hemorrhage right there and then. So much blood came rushing out of her…I—I thought I had killed her.”

“Brutalized? How?” Pepper whispers, dreading the answer, thought the clench in her stomach tells her she already half suspects.

“The kind only cruel men can do,” Bruce whispers right back, barely lifting his gaze to look at her, “she was covered in botched Alpha bites, half of them were oozing black. And the damage to her vaginal area…I don’t know how that kid managed to walk in here on her own two feet.”

Pepper can feel her heart twisting in her chest. Bone aching despair entering her being like a jagged knife. She can hardly take a breath in to steady her swirling mind, but, she stubbornly does as she asks, “Who’s with her now?”

“Dr. Manveer Kahanna,” Bruce answers with a tired sigh, “She’s a surgeon that specializes in operations this severe. She just started and kicked me out.”

Pepper doesn’t know if she answers or not. She knows only that the buzzing energy that brought her flying her leaves her suddenly. She drops with as much grace as Bruce had into the chairs beside him. She can feel her heart slowing and steadily sinking into her stomach. She can feel the whimpers of devastation finally being voiced. She can smell, in her own scent, the evidence of her heartache. Bone crushing guilt laces every single one of her tears as she sits there.

Without a word, Bruce hands her a crumpled piece of paper stained in something brown. It takes Pepper a moment to gather it in her hands and a while longer for her to recognize it completely.

The scrawl of her own handwriting glares at her from under the browning blood. Tears slip and fall from her face like wild rivers.

*~*

How long they sit there, side by side, Pepper does not know. She does not check and she does not call out for Jarvis to tell her. She simply waits there and stares at the silver door that leads into the emergency/operating room of E5. She knows it is long enough for the staff in Medical to discretely gather a change of clothes for Bruce and to hand it over to him. Bruce changes in an empty Emergency room but sits right back into his previous spot and does not offer a single word to her.

Pepper wouldn’t have answered either way.

There is a heavy weight in her hand that keeps Pepper from rising from her seat. A weight that sits like the whole of the world upon her lap. A weight that feels like guilt, like failure, like disappointment and something like murder. A weight that comes in the shape of her business card covered in blood.

She has laid it out on her lap. The stark contrast of that ratty, torn and wrinkled card has against her finely pressed black skirt is almost laughable. Everything in her wishes to toss that card out. To take it somewhere and burn it. To make it so that it no longer existed. But guilt keeps it on her lap. Keeps it there so it can glare up at her and mock her with her failure.

Tears gather in her red and swollen eyes.

The comforting smooth rumbles of the man at her side keep her from falling into her own pit of despair entirely. His presence is so calm, his scent so warm, causes her to find comfort in him. The old frail bond still echoing between them too.

Once, not too long ago, they had looked upon each other and had seen the future of their pack. Pepper would have been proud to have called Bruce her Pack-Brother. But then the Accords had happened and the world went to hell. Friends turned against one another, countries rose and fell and Bonds were inevitably broken.

Before she can delve too deep in those thoughts, silver doors that lead into E5 burst open. A clatter of noises spill into the otherwise silent corridor. With rushed movements only ever conjured up by those in the medical profession, a figure dressed in light green scrubs heads in their direction.

“Uh, excuse me, Mr. Banner, you wouldn’t happen to know her medical history, would you?” the man in the scrubs asks, his words half muffled by the face covering he wears.

“Wha—no. No! I just meet her this morning! She didn’t even give me her name,” Bruce exclaims at first and then stands abruptly, “Why? What’s happening?”

“Well, it’s been very touch and go. We started her on a blood transfusion but we haven’t yet gotten to stop the hemorrhaging. She just keeps bleeding and we don’t know why. Dr. Kahanna wanted to know if had sometime of illness or was on a certain type of medication that would effective her bloods inability to clot. And—L” the man starts only to trail off as he spared a glance back to the silver doors.

“And what?” Pepper demands as she straightened up and stood, her spine rigidly straight as she glared the nameless faceless man down.

“The doctor noticed some irregularities in her…injuries. We needed to make sure she wasn’t…well, you know,” the man vaguely tells them.

Arching a blonde brow Pepper acidly tells him, “No, I’m afraid I don’t know.”

“Dr. Kahanna thinks she might be an _Omega_ ,” the man informs them in a hushed tone, as if afraid some passerby would glean the information.

Shock litters both Pepper and Bruce’s face as they take in the information.

“And why is that?” Bruce asks, as he is the first to shake off the surprise.

“Low cost suppressants have been known to not mix well with certain types of pain medications and some antibiotics. They can thin the blood down,” the man says.

Nodding Bruce mutters, “I see.”

“Well, as Dr. Banner has explained, we do not know her Medical history nor do we know of her Dynamic. So simply treat her as if she were on suppressants and make her well,” Pepper suddenly demands with a bark when it looks as if the man is simply standing there, idle.

“Yes ma’am, sorry,” the man says before rushing back into the operating room.

And just like that, She and Bruce are left alone once more. Both in their respective seats and staring at the silver doors.

*~*

The next time the silver doors open, it has been well over fourteen hours. This time she knows only because Jarvis has deigned it fit to bother her every hour, on the hour, to go down and get some rest or something to eat. She’s ignored every single one of his none to gentle prodding’s to go.

When they open, it is because Dr. Kahanna herself has stepped out. The woman is dressed in green scrubs and donning a surgeon’s cap upon her thick black hair. Her richly mocha face is pinched with weariness and a hard day’s work. Her black brows are pinched in a way that can only convey concern. The doctor walks easily over to them.

Pepper and Bruce rise wordlessly from their seats standing shoulder to shoulder like the Pack they might have been.

“Ms. Potts, Dr. Banner,” Dr. Kahanna greets them with a dutiful nod of her head, “She’s stable now.”

“How…” Pepper begins only to balk.

As if sensing her inability to voice the question herself, Bruce continues on, “Will she live?”

“Of course, her injuries were most extensive and the worst I have ever personally dealt with, but she will be fine. Barring any infections, she should be able to go home after a month of hospitalization,” Dr. Kahanna announces in her accented voice, “She will be sedated for the next couple of days, to allow the injuries to heal without interruption and the stress of pain. But when she wakes I hope to clear some issues with her.”

Absorbing the information as it flowed, Pepper easily asks, without thought, “Issues?”

“Well, madam, it is not my place to over step my bounds of patient-doctor confidentialities, but it appears this has not been the first time this young girl has seen this type of abuse. The scars on her person tell an unfortunate story of her life,” Dr. Kahanna tells her, “The damage she’s received over the years looks to be irreparable. If she is indeed what I suspect she is, she will need to be informed of the consequences this act.”

Before either she or Bruce can answer the sound of Dr. Kahanna’s name being called pulls the doctor away. With a simple nod of her head the doctor is gone and they are left alone. The silence of the corridor is nearly suffocating. But no more than the knowledge that now sits dark and heavy in Pepper’s whirling mind.  

Picking up on her scent, and maybe in the mangy little bond they share, Bruce takes her elbow in hand and steers her into room E5. Silently they enter as the last of the nurse’s exit. The blood and the evidence of a large surgery having taken place mere moments before have all disappeared. What sits in the room now is only the bed, the large machines she is hooked up to and the girl herself.

For the first time in months, Pepper is able to look upon the girl who stole a piece of her heart away. What she is confronted with makes her openly sob. The girl, already so petite, looked don right tiny upon the large bed. Her skin was nearly paper white, blending in with the crisp sheets laid atop of her. Her hair, a deep chocolate shade, hung in a wild tangled snarl upon the pillow top.

For a lack of a better word, Lela looked dead.

With that though running through her head, Pepper rushes to her side. Eager to make sure, despite the monitor of the machines at her side saying so, that the girl was in fact breathing. Laying a trembling hand upon the girl, Pepper can barely make out the heat of a living person. The chill of her skin making Pepper shiver as tears slipped from her eyes.

Dropping herself onto the bed, mindful of the extensive set of wires connected to the girl, Pepper claims the open right side of Lela’s bed. An overwhelming need to stay, to keep safe, to guard the broken girl gnawing at every one of her instincts. Quietly, she cries as she gently combs those tangles out of chocolate colored locks with her fingers.

“How did you know her?” Bruce asks, only after it becomes apparent that Pepper’s tears were not to be subsided any time soon.

“She…” Pepper begins with a hiccup, “She saved me once. She was my Knight.”

 

* * *

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So what'd y'all think?
> 
> -Ani


	14. An update for a question

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> So I wrote a quick update because I wanted to ask y'all a question and I didn't want to have to post it and have y'all feel duped in any way.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> PLEASE READ THE END NOTES!  
> PLEASE  
> PLEASE!  
> PLEASE!

 

* * *

 

 

Three days later

Contrary to popular belief, Pepper does not live in Tony’s pocket nor does he live in hers. She does not share a home with him, at least, not anymore. And more often than not, they do go whole weeks without actually speaking face to face with one another.

They had once, been utterly inseparable. They had once shared a work space, a home, an office, and a whole life with one another. Once, they had been such a tightly woven unit their scents were indistinguishable from one another. Her own chamomile scent blending naturally with his distinctly orchid one.

Things were different now. So much had changed. The world had gone topsy turvy and the waters between Tony and herself had grown muddy and vast.

Of course, she trusted him still. Despite the Ultron incident and in the face of the Accords. She trusted him, even if she now kept things from him. Because she knows, Tony did what he had done, with the best of intentions. Still, the road to hell he had paved had been one with built on his ‘good intentions’. And she, those were her friends Tony was locking up. The personal information he had used to do what he had done, gathered from her blackberry without her permission.  

The point is, though, there are times that she and Tony hardly speak. A quick email shot back and forth, or game of telephone on Jarvis’ dime, and that’s about it. The longest they’ve gone between actual in-person interaction had been a full two months. Not a hard feat to accomplish when she runs most of the Legal and business-like ventures of the company and he spends most of his time holed up in his private labs. His time split with that of the Avengers and whatever crisis was breaking.

Their lives, like it had been back when Tony had drowned his troubles in liquor, were lived entirely separate.

Neither of them entirely over the wounds they had received contrary to their often-uttered assurances.

Her being holed up in a medical room, watching over her new charge, for three whole days did not in fact raise any red flags. She conducted her business through her laptop and on the small pull out table she had ordered to be put in.

“You should go home, get some rest,” Bruce says from the left side of the room.

Without glancing up, she knows exactly where the man is. For he’s been in the same place in the last three days. On the other side of the room, on Lela’s left side, he sits, under the window in a cushy deep navy chair. Today’s paper lies in his hand as he works his way through the crossword puzzle. His curls a mess, his dress shirt rumpled, his slacks some variant of brown and his usual glasses sitting on the bridge of his nose.

“So, should you,” Pepper murmurs as she eyes an email sent to her by their executive manager over in their Californian branch. When the numbers do nothing but jumble with one another, she turns to really look at the man. His disheveled appearance amplified by the dark bags underneath his eyes.

For as long as Pepper has been here, seated upon her own navy-blue chair, so has Bruce. He has stood with Pepper, at her elbow, watching as various wires and tubes were changed upon Lela. He stood with her, wordlessly, as Pepper cared for her. Never giving reason as to why or for what. He simply stood with her and wrangled tea when she felt the weight of guilt crushing her chest inward.

Why, has sat on her tongue for the entirety of the three days. Why, she wants to ask every time he tucks the new sheets around Lela. Why, Pepper almost asks when Bruce steps out only to come back with lunch. Why, she wants to demand of him, when he covers Pepper with a blanket when she dozes off.

“Why haven’t you gone home Bruce?” she questions him softly, pushing away her laptop table and focusing on the other man.

Shrugging his shoulders, Bruce tears his gaze away from her, his shoulders sloping downward, his face neutral and his scent perfectly contained, “Well, I have what the experts think are a mild form of insomnia, I figure why be at home doing nothing, by myself, when I can do nothing here with you and keep you company while doing so.”

She, better than anyone, knows how integral Bruce was to the Bio department. She knew, better than anyone, how he was needed for most of the work being pumped out of there. She knows his absence from it all was not being taken as lightly as hers. She knows he has turned off his cellphone. She also knows that Bruce has explicitly asked Jarvis not to inform him of official pages while he is in the room with her. So, she pulls no punches.

“Liar,” Pepper accuses him easily enough, her gaze piercing his.

His tanned hands easily folding the black and white paper so that he may pull his glasses off. His gaze wanders to the figure on the bed and as he takes in the sight of a battered, purple and blue, waifish figure his body tightens. The corners of his lips tipping downward as he frowns with disapproval His eyes are gentle when he turns to look at Pepper. His scent a steady wave of comfort as he tells her:

“I don’t know what to tell you Pep. I don’t know why I’m here either. I don’t know the kid, not like you do, but every time I look at her all I can see is the way she hit the ground in a bloody mess. Every time I get up to go, I remember her face, the way she had looked at me for help before they surrounded her. Even when I close my eyes I can see the bites she wore, the bleeding lashes on her back, the horror of her body and I can’t force myself to leave.”

 A shuddering breath spills from Peppers pink lips, her eyes falling down to her hands upon her lap. She had read, against her better judgement and Bruce’s advice, the medical report on Lela. She read what some nameless monster had inflicted upon Lela’s person. She read and cried and cried. Still now, she can feel tears building.

“and if that’s no enough to keep me here, rooted to my spot, I have to look across this…” Bruce continues on, only to have his words fail when his eyes meet hers. Nervously wetting his lips, Bruce seems to steel himself as he confesses, “We may never have been Pack—officially, but, I do still…I still care about you. And when I see you, looking so broken and grief stricken, crying yourself sick—I can’t find it in me to be anywhere but here. At your side until this is over.”

There’s a great big lump in Peppers throat. A lump full of emotions and words better left unsaid. A lump Pepper fights to swallow past. Her hand carefully wiping the side of her face that has grown wet with tears.  

With great difficulty, Pepper finds her courage and tells him, “Thank you Bruce.”

Shrugging his shoulders awkwardly, Banner says as he rubs the back of his neck, “What are friends for, huh?”

"Pack," Pepper corrects him, her shoulders straightening as she gathered her strength and lifted her chin. Her eyes taking on a determined glint as they wandered from the doctor to the figure on the bed, "That's what Pack is for."

 

* * *

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey, I know, this chapter went no where.  
> But like I said, I wanted to ask y'all a question and I thought about doing a post with just the question but I know what it feels like to see an update in my email only to find an authors quip. Instead, I thought I'd write out a quick chapter and pose my question as well.  
> A little trade, as it were. A scene for a question. Quid pro quo?  
> No?  
> (Did I use that right? Idk, I have no formal schooling.)  
> Any who~~
> 
>  
> 
> Right, My question.   
> Who do y'all want Tony to be paired up with?  
> Tony/Pepper?  
> Tony/Bruce?  
> OR because it's 20-fucking-17  
> Pepper/Tony/Bruce
> 
>  
> 
> Please PLEASE answer. I'm in a semi writers block because my anxious depressive ass is fixating on this and won't let me move forward.
> 
> Any and all suggestions are welcome!!  
> -Ani
> 
>  
> 
> P.S. I feel like you all should be made aware of the fact that I have a severe dislike to the ting known as 'Timelines' and as such will not in any way respect it.


	15. Caught Waking

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lela finds herself in a room with a familiar face.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hope you guys enjoy  
> See end notes for the apology

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

Waking, after a definitively long time, is always something of a fucking hassle. It isn’t like what she’s read in those broken spined novels bought off second hand stores. They always say something like ‘ _being enveloped in cotton’_ or ‘ _submerged in water’_. Right now, she wants to know what kind of fairy like drugs they were on that made them feel something so calm and peaceful like. Because at the moment, she’s calling bullshit on that seeing as to how she’s just on the verge of waking from something like a dead man’s sleep.

The closest she can think of to compare it to, while still being caught in the clutches of it, is as if someone is slowly dragging her out of a pit of wet concrete. Her arms and legs are brick heavy as if damp sand were covering every inch of her.

Unconsciousness fills her mouth and nose, makes it so she can barely open her eyes or lift her limbs. There’s a numb feeling in her legs and her back like maybe she’s not moved in more than just hours. The pin like pain suddenly filling the flesh currently laying on something contradicts this numbness, of course.

Everything aches in a way that can only be described as **bone** _deep_.

Idly, she contemplates allowing that unconsciousness, thick and oppressive as it is, to bury her entirely. For it to slither it’s thick suffocating self-down her throat and keep her in the dark forever. She doesn’t want to feel that pain again when she wakes. The pain that was everywhere—all over her body and in her soul—the pain in her ribs, in her hands, in her back, in her throat and in her broken weeping womanly center. She doesn’t want to wake to that pain again. She also, most importantly, doesn’t want to wake to that _other_ type of pain.

The pain that she woke with, lived with, breathed with, and existed harboring in her heart. She doesn’t want to wake only to go back to shooting up paint thinner laced Hormone Blockers or snorting Suppressants until her nose bled.

But, like most things in her life, she has little control over the pull of consciousness. She keeps getting dragged, feet first, into the land of the savage living.

Nothing gets easier the more awake she becomes. Opening her eyes feels like she’s rubbing them with something salty and grainy, tears gather at the edges of her eyes. Light floods her eyes when she finally manages to blink away the tears. What she sees does not surprise her, a white ceiling and florescent lights, the tall tale markings of a hospital room. But, then again, it could very well be the nurses ward in some type of detention center for all she knew.

Some type of habit, hard wired directly into her worthless dynamic, causes her to pull a lungful through her nose. Her mangled hindbrain searching out whatever others could be lurking just around the corner. Her hindbrain, battered as it is, seeking the scents of friend or foe. Reaching out to scent musk of a nearby Alpha, the cool waves of Betas or the earthy smell of Gammas. Her nose works to map out the layouts, searching for unmated, unclaimed and viable sources of compatible scents. A low burning feeling is slowly building in the pit of her stomach.

What she finds is the tang of cinnamon, apple and paprika. A scent so space heavy she can taste the sweet apple flavor on her tongue. It’s vaguely familiar. Something uncomfortable shifts just underneath her skin. A low echoing _want_ to sniff the air more and bring it fully within herself. Urgency suddenly falls upon her then, urgency to lift her head, move her limbs and wake fully.

It doesn’t occur to her then, as she lifts her head to survey the room, why she is spurred on.

Despite the ache in her bones and the pull of drying stitches, she hauls herself upright. Her head spinning all the while as she’s caught her swaying upper body by gripping tight upon the large plastic railings of the bed. Through her swirling vision, she can make out wires, an IV, and many other things running form her body and out to machines of all sizes and types. Forcing her eyes to focus she peers about the room and takes in the settings of a rather extensively outfitted hospital room she’s in.

The walls of the room were painted a nice robin eggshell shade that went well with the deep blueberry colored chairs. Everything else was painted in an off-white color or that of nearly translucent pastel blue. There was sunlight, midday light, streaming into the room from the large bay windows on the left side of the bed she found herself in. A door, at the far end of her bed, was only slightly opened allowing her the briefest sliver of a private bathroom. Her ears prick at the sound of someone messing about in there.

Distantly, she thinks, it is the prettiest hospital room she’d ever woken up in. She wonders what the bill will end up looking like. And then…

That thought just spills right out of her head as the scent of spicy cinnamon, apple pie and paprika rouse her decrepit hindbrain. She can feel the stirrings of something primal coming to life. Like a flicker of a lightbulb improperly installed. Threatening to take life entirely before sputtering out again and again. The scent, barely even musky, but so utterly appealing, is the scent of an UnMated Gamma Male. The ring of pheromones, not even vaguely suppressed by even a body wash, makes her canines descend. The end trail of that scent pulling her attention to the bathroom where some faceless person moves about.

The ache in her bones, the coiling heat in her belly, the slithering itch underneath her skin intensifies now that she is awake in full to taste that scent.

A rumbling growl begins in the mid of her chest and threatens to bubble up her throat and out into the room. A rumbling cry of…of…

She freezes stalk still as her brain races to catch up to her blathering thoughts. That cry—that bullshit assed _cry_ —dies in her throat quick, as it had begun to build. With the speed of a jet runners’ engine, she backtracks every thought over a second time. From the moment she began to gain consciousness to the moment she captured that delectable scent, she plays it all back. What she finds makes her want to coil back into herself and wrap her hands around her own throat.

For the better part of a full month, she had been suppressing her heat. She’d been pushing it back with her blockers, with her suppressants too, cutting them with heroine and lacing the rest of it in low grade cocaine. It had had her well and truly fucked up, but it had kept it— _her Heat_ —from showing up like it was now. A displeased growl, acidic and deadly, shakes her chest as she grinds her elongated teeth against one another. Her finger nails digging themselves into the hard plastic of the railings.

The Gamma must hear her growl, or by chance alone, is brought back into the room. It is then that she is confronted with the sight of him and his tantalizing scent in full.

Immediately she spots curls, wide glasses, brown pants and a rumpled dress shirt. Immediately, heat blurred brain or not, she knows that Gamma man and suddenly remembers why she thought that apple pie scent was familiar.

“Banner,” she hisses out through her clenched teeth as she fights the weakest side of herself. Bitter anger swells up in her, self-loathing running hot and wild in her veins, as she internally batters her weak dynamic to grow a fucken pair and just keep it all together, “Doctor Banner?”

Wide brown eyes take her in with shock fluttering fast and free across his modest and tanned features. His lips, soft and gentle, part like a fish out of water as he tries—but _fails_ —to find words. Eventually, he stutters out as he lurches towards her, “Y-You’re awake!”

His movements are too fast, too aggressive, and in and of itself—while in her weakened state—makes for an ugly response. But her battered mind, hindbrain or not, still remembers the abuse of the previous Alpha. It pulls at her to make herself small. To bare her throat and whine. It makes her flinch hard. In doing so, it also causes deep and bitter hate to swallow her whole. Rage so sharp it could peel paint floods her veins. Revulsion so bone deep makes her teeth drop for more than just her teetering heat.

Her mother’s voice whipping at her with her disgusted tone, ‘ _You fucking weak Omega_. _Fight you useless bitch._ ’

A savage roar is ripped from her throat as she snaps her teeth at the approaching doctor. Her eyes fixing themselves square upon his shocked gaze. Her chin dipped down so that there is no mistaking her reaction for that of a friendly one. Despite the pain, and with anger fueling her movements, she has pulled her body up into a position where the IV’s and cords strain. Her body tense and pulled taut as she warns the UnMated Gamma that she is not about to be approached for any reason.

Her stance is no better than a rabid dog when backed into a corner: Wild and dangerous.

“I just want to help,” Banner explains, his hands up high as if she’s pulled some type of weapon. His expression pinched and lost. His scent exuding nothing suspicious other than calming notes.

Through clenched teeth she growls at him, “that’s what you said before.”

“A-And I mean it still!” The doctor defends himself. His head tilted low in a clear sign of submission. His shoulders dropped and his neck in no way protected.

The sight is enough to make her physically sick. She’s seen acts of submission day in and out in her long life. From a Beta’s and Gamma’s alike, she’s seen them drop their shoulders, tilt their heads to the side, their scents becoming warm and soft like. For cops, for bigger and more dangerous people, for food, for money, for drugs, and for a place to sleep at night.

The sight has always made something engrained, etched into her fucking DNA, slither. That Dynamics, higher than herself, submit so readily makes her want to do so to. Her neck becomes loose, her body wishes to drop, her knees become weak and her mind empties itself out.

It takes every ounce of her strength to keep her neck facing forward, her spine ramrod straight and her scent anything but malleable.

“What the fuck happened?” she hisses at him through her canines.

“Your injuries, they were far more intensive than I had initially thought them to be. You began to hemorrhage on the table, you had to be rushed into emergency surgery,” the Doctor tells her as he slowly lowered his hands. Soft brown eyes slowly meeting hers, his gaze gauging hers to see if she would attack him.

“Did you patch me up?” she demands of him.

Nodding he tells her, “A specialist was brought in to treat you, Dr. Manveer Kahanna.”

“Why a specialist,” she questions without thought, her throat still shaking with those near subatomic rumbles.

Nervously, a pink tongue peaks out from between the Doctors parted lips. His eyes flashing form her face to the large bay windows and the New York Skyline. She can taste his apprehension clearly hanging in the air around him. When she growls at him he straightens his caving posture and tells, “S-She’s a specialist for the… _type_ of ah… _injuries_ you’ve ah…endured.”

“My _type_ of injury?” she hisses back. Her body curling into itself as her mind races.

 _‘They know’_ is a black-fear smeared mantra running through her jumbled mind. The word ‘ _Specialist’_ having her heart thump like a rabbits foot against her ribcage.

“Ma’am,” The doctor says, a heavy sigh slipping past his lips as he pinned her with a steady unwavering stare, “You were raped.”

His words ring in the silence that seems to drop like a heavy wet blanket on the whole of the room. The word, ugly and dark as it is, seems to hit her like a stray brick being chucked off the empire state building. She feels it hitting her mind and rattling around in there like a stray bullet. It makes something nameless, weighted and hollow echo in her.

The clang of a graveyard church bell being rung.

She doesn’t like it, that word. She’s never liked it. Never liked that it could happen, did happen, and nothing could be done about it. She hates that word like she hated her Dynamic. She hates that word like she hates her mother and her father, whoever he was.

She hates that word because her brain immediately syncs up that word with the word ‘victim’. She hates that word because her mind implies that she really is weaker than others. A word that proved she was just a thing to be used when people chased their pleasures.

She hated that word like she hates herself.

“I wasn’t raped,” she half snarls, her lips pulled up over her fangs in her rage.

The doctor looks equal parts horrified and uncomfortable, but he continues on, “Y-Your injuries were intense and severe enough that the only logical conclusion is that you were—”

Before he can finish she growls at him, something hollow rattling in her chest as she ignored and denied the racing thoughts in her mind, “I had a bad run in with a John. Plain and simple. I wasn’t… I **_wasn’t_**.”

“ _Ah_ ,” Dr. Banner mumbles awkwardly as he stuffed his hands into his khaki slacks and chanced a glance down to the off-white tile floor, “I see.”

Dr. Banner looks as unconvinced as she herself feels.

Risking a centimeter back into a mildly comfortable position, Lela completely ignores the clear displeased sour notes radiating off the Gamma Man and informs him, “I want to leave.”

“Y-You can’t!” Dr. Banner abruptly shouts, his eyes wide. Noticing the darkness in the heated glare she pins him with, he is quick to explain himself, “W-Well, you can, I mean. You’re not a prisoner. I just m-meant that it would be detrimental to your healing process!”

When he is met with only silence and her glaring eyes, he babbles onward, his scent clearly distressed and his hand half flailing about, “I mean it would be harmful for your healing process. Detrimental…it means to cause harm. You know… _bad_?”

“I don’t care what it means,” she growls at him, ignoring the pull in her chest that winces when Dr. Banner does. The stuttering well intended Gamma Man that smelled of apples and cinnamon did not deserve the hate she uses in every growl directed at him. But she needs to leave. She needs to go before they figure out the worst thing about her. Something they already might know considering a specialist was brought in to treat her.

A specialist who might know exactly where to look to find out what she was without a doubt. A specialist that would undoubtedly uncover the worst of herself and have her finally officially labeled as a damned dynamic. A specialist that would make all the years in the muck and the grime utterly fucking _pointless_.

Wordlessly, she begins to pull on the wires attached to her body. The clips to the jelly patches firmly pasted to her skin undo without much of a fight. Her IV, pumping liquid nourishment, is the only thing she does with any amount of care. The needles halfway out before the doctor is rushing forward towards her.

“Stop! Wait!” he yells, his gamma barks of distress ringing in her ears as he hurries to still her hands.

Growling like only an alpha can, she causes him to freeze. His eyes are wide as she snaps her teeth at him. The thundering noise spilling from her throat a far cry from a welcoming noise. It’s a dangerous thing, that growl, one that was knee deep drenched in blood. It’s a roar worthy of a dive bar brawl and it causes the Gamma to freeze in place as she rips her IV off.

“I want to leave,” she informs him through tightly clenched teeth.

“I’m not saying you won’t,” the Gamma tells her, breathing in through his mouth a deep breath and releasing it through his nose. His eyes, dark and deep like rosewood bark, bore into her for in them lies some fathomless emotion she cannot begin to understand.

In those eyes, she can see his concern for her well-being bleeding out into the lines etched into his brow. In those eyes, she can see his fear before it manifests itself in his scent in notes of freshly shaved lemon peels and rotted birch wood. In those eyes, she can see his care for her, a stranger, burning and pleading for her to see reason.

“Ten minutes,” he suddenly says, his voice—smooth and comforting like running water over river rocks—pitched low and careful as he continued to meet her glaring eyes with surprising ease, “I’m just asking for ten minutes.”

A ‘No’ sits on her tongue as heavy as a rotting watermelon. ‘Fuck no’ is half being mouthed out as she stares into those guileless eyes. A ‘Fuck you and your ten fucking minutes’ stands at the ready as she grips in her hand a bloodied IV needle.

There is a million and one reasons she should tell this gamma man, this Dr. Banner, No. A million and one ways she can do it and with utter fucking ease.

But, locked in that concerned stare, her tongue is weighed and caught still.

At the sight of her hesitation the good doctor jumps, “Pepper…” that name makes something sharp twist in her chest, “stay at least until she can see you. She’s worried.”

“Worried?” she questions, her body having fallen lax at the mere mention of that golden haired goddess.

Memories of clean laundry, sun kissed skin and sky tipped eyes makes something like yearning spill into her caving chest.

“She’s been here since you were first brought in. Won’t leave that chair for fear you might wake and be alone,” Banner tells her, as he inches ever closer to her. His hands, soft and sun browned, are warm when they pull the needle from her frozen fingers.

“She’s been waiting for me?” the question she had hoped would come out gruff and laced in a half growl. It is not. It comes out in a half whisper and her heart stirs and her hindbrain gives a futile kick.

The thought of Pepper, beautiful sweet and kind Pepper, sitting at her bedside makes some cruel emotion twist in her heart.

“She has and the least we can do is give her ten minutes to finish her shower and race her way back down here,” Banner mumbles as he takes a seat to the left of her bed. His eyes never wavering from hers. No lie hidden in his scent as he carefully sent a wobbling smile her way.

She’s tempted, spurred by her paranoia and her fear, to bolt up and out of here. (Wherever here is.) Pepper and her kindness be damned, but, she does not. She thinks back to the hope, a flicker of candle like flame, she carried with her as she stumbled bloody and broken through New york city streets. She thinks back to Pepper and her smiles and her promise to help. And she thinks, more than anything, about those eyes being weighted down by worry. Worry over her, a half person, a useless little thing, a dirty little Alpha poser.

Her temptation dies at the hands of her mind consuming guilt.

“Ten minutes,” she growls, her eyes turning hard and her teeth bared yet again, “If she’s not here by then, I’m biting my way out of this place.”

Banner, mild mannered, awkward as he may be, as calm as his scents may be, is not at all surprised by her threat. He simply nods his head graciously and smiles.

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> okay seriously you guys, I am SOOOOOOO sorry.  
> I took my computer in because for whatever reason every time I turned it on it would shut down for no reason. It ended up taking forever to get it fixed and then when it was, I didn't have the cash to pull it out. Then I got it out and guess the fuck what?  
> All my files, every single thing I have ever written, POEMS STORIES CHAPTERS to every fucking FIC I have ever given life to was GONE!!!!!  
> I have never cried so hard in my life.   
> So I know this chapter seems a bit disjointed. But I owe you guys a chapter and I will not let life beat me the fuck down. No wayyyyy, I have invested too much time, energy and love into this shit!!!  
> so yeah, sorry it took so long!!!!!  
> I hope you enjoyed!!!!  
> let me know in the comments what y'all thought!!!
> 
> XOXO  
> Ani


	16. Running

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Trust me doc,” Lela begins, a cruel type of smile spreading across her mouth as she eyed the beautiful Beta before her, “I’ve had worse, I know how to take care of myself.”
> 
> It isn’t a total lie. Half of Lela’s life seems to be made up of nursing wounds like these. Of having to patch herself up in the safety of a motel room. Of having to bite back a cry of pain when someone fucked into her a little too hard. She’s an old hand at this by now. And as much as she hates it, as much as it burns her, she knows come four months from now, she’ll probably have to do it again.

 

* * *

 

 

Once, when she was just a kid, knobby kneed and bright eyed, she’d come across this old woman. Everyone in their little neighborhood had called her a witch. They crossed their chest in the way old superstitious folk always did. They muttered prayers beneath their breath and kept a careful distance from the old woman.

And back then, back before she turned out to be what she is, Lela had always been a curious kid. She’d sought the woman out, looked for her over the crowds of the Sunday morning markets. She’d search for black and white curly hair and wondered.

There was something about that old woman. Witch or not, the old lady walked with such confidence one would think she had the secret of the world sitting at the tip of her tongue. Lela always watched her whisk by with her colorful dresses and skirts. Her little nose trailing after a scent that was a strange mixture of softness and sugar. Lela had been mesmerized by her.

And then she’d learned why people were wary of the old lady. Old she was, but the old lady packed a hell of a growl. Her nicotine yellow teeth were sharp as daggers anytime someone tried to push her out of their way. Her growl worthy of cage fighters. She was all of four feet and some inches of fury bundled up in floral prints. She was wild.

Wild and untamed.

 _Unclaimed_.

She was an _Omega_ , the older folks had whispered in the dead of night. An omega that had been married once. An omega that had seen the brutal parts of a mating and had sunk her teeth into her mates neck and ended it. An omega who had gone mad. They whispered about her like she was some kind of goblin from a horror story. Like a wild monster walking around in the light of day.

Lela was young then. Could not comprehend why—or how—someone could kill an Alpha that had sworn to protect and provide for her. Lela was young then and so she hadn’t understood. Lela was young so she stopped looking after the old woman. Stopped wanting to steal glimpses of her least some strange misfortune fall upon her head.

Lela was young then and so she never understood the kind of strength an Omega must have had to kill their mate.

Lela isn’t so young anymore now. So she understands now. She wishes the old lady was still alive. She wishes she could walk up to her and beg her for some of that confidence the old crone had in spades.

She could use it these days, even a drop would do. Especially now, laid up in a hospital bed and at the end of a medically stern hazel gaze.

There’s a certain type of strangeness fluttering around in Lela’s blood. Making her both drowsy and painfully alert. Every word out of the dark skinned doctors mouth is going in one ear and out the other. She doesn’t understand half of it. Couldn’t care less what’s being said. Her attention is firmly placed on the clock above the in suite bathroom. The one that says she’s only five minutes into her ten promised.

Everything in Lela would love to blame it on the drugs she’s been given. Nice and beautiful little mind numbing pills she’d tossed back dry and quickly. But she knows better. It’s her heat, fast approaching. Nipping at her heels like rabid angry dogs. She can feel the damnable itch just beneath her flesh. Aching for something, anything.

Lela grits her teeth angrily at the sensation. She needs to get the fuck out of this enclosed room. She needs to make the mad dash back to her motel room. She needs t not be here. Where any passing Alpha or Beta could take a whiff and peg her for what she is.

“Ma’am, are you listening,” the good doctor asks in a tone that is both offended and outraged. Her dark brows pinched as if she knows that Lela isn’t.

Wetting her dry lips, Lela pulls herself closer to the edge of the bed. All the wires that had been tying her down are gone now. One well-placed growl had stopped the nurses from stopping her. She’d ripped everything off of herself the moment Dr. Banner had fluttered from the room. His soft brown eyes filled with worry and a small dash of fear.

Slowly, Lela had redressed herself. Pulled on her ratty clothes—clean and fresh smelling—one piece at a time. Every movement had been laced in pain. The stitches and staples in her flesh were drying, but nowhere near ready to be pulled out yet. It’ll be another week before she can take on Johns. Her cunt practically burned when she bent down to shove her boots back on.

“Your injuries were extensive,” the doctor tells her, tone hard edged.

Without looking up, Lela merely bites out, “So I heard.”

“I wouldn’t recommend you moving at all. You’ve only spent a week in recovery. You need to stay bed ridden for at least a month!” the doctor exclaims. Her tone growing frantic as Lela rose to stand.

“Trust me doc,” Lela begins, a cruel type of smile spreading across her mouth as she eyed the beautiful Beta before her, “I’ve had worse, I know how to take care of myself.”

It isn’t a total lie. Half of Lela’s life seems to be made up of nursing wounds like these. Of having to patch herself up in the safety of a motel room. Of having to bite back a cry of pain when someone fucked into her a little too hard. She’s an old hand at this by now. And as much as she hates it, as much as it burns her, she knows come four months from now, she’ll probably have to do it again.

The heavy knowledge has a growl building up in her throat. Lela aches for something to bite into and tear. Her fingers curl tight into the hem of the long sleeved shirt she’s managed to pull into place. Her knuckles go white with the intensity of her grip.

Heaving a tired sigh, the doctor—Kahanna—grits out, “Ma’am, I have to ask, are you—We, _no_ , I have reason to suspect you are an Omega.”

The word serves to freeze Lela in place. That disgusting fucking word makes everything that had gone soft in her turn into wicked venom tipped spikes. Her body goes tight with tension. Fear spikes her heart into a rabbit beat. Her teeth grow long as she feels the danger in the air grow heavy. Bile rises in her throat, hot bitter and acidic. Lela can practically taste it already.

Turning, slow and dangerous, Lela eyes the good doctor and spits out as calmly as she can, “ ** _No_**.”

If a single word could burn, then this one did. Lela glared, murderously, at the doctor before her. She pushed every ounce of her revolting hate into that two letter answer. A growl, deep, angry and vicious laced it. Made it so that there was no wriggle room for anyone to question it.

Dr. Kahanna looks unconvinced, but nods her head in one jerked motion. Slowly, the doctor informs her, her mouth working carefully over the words she says, “I am not asking so that I can label you, _officially_. From what I understand, you asked Dr. Banner for an unofficial consultation. I just need to know if you are so that I can better treat you.”

“You aren’t treating me,” Lela growled out, her lips pulling up into a time worn snarl, “I’m _leaving_.”

Lela would be fucking damned if she was going to be caught here any longer than necessary with a Doctor who thought she knew best for her. She’d rather hunt down that Alpha fuck who put her in here and ask him for another round.

“Again, I would advise against that,” Dr. Kahanna repeats. Her scent going sour and ugly with her distress and frustration, “If you are an Omega—”

Snarling like a rabid beast, Lela snaps her teeth at the doctor. If she could muster up the strength to fight, Lela would dig her teeth into the soft junction of coca rich neck meat. But Lela is nowhere near ready for something like that. Instead, she reaches out to grab hold of her bag. Her leather jacket is draped over the back of some plush looking couch to the left of her. The flight or fight instincts are roaring up in her head. She wants so badly to fly away from this situation, to turn tail and run. The longer she stands here the more the doctor will keep spilling that fucking word out for the whole of the world to hear.

Everything in her is screaming at her to run. To fucking jet as fast as her weak legs can push her. To flee back into the safety of some dark alley where doctors couldn’t make her do shit. Soon someone will walk in, smell the distress in the air and know. They’ll fucking _know_! And there won’t be a damn thing Lela could do about it then.

But she doesn’t do that. She can’t.

 _‘You hold your fucking ground Lela. You keep a challenger in your sights. You meet them head on and never bend your head’_ her mothers voice roars in her head.

That mangled piece of herself, slowly waking now that she hasn’t properly dosed it dead, is pulling at her. It wants to run away like a scared wounded little thing. But Lela will be damned if she’s going to give that fucking doctor more of a reason to believe she’s anything but the Gamma Lela pretends to be.

So Lela forces herself still. She irons out the unease and fear from her figure into something hard-edged and dangerous. Turning her body, so she’s facing the doctor in full, Lela widens her stance and plants her feet. Carefully, she raises her head and bares her teeth in a nasty snarl. A challenging growl slips from between her too sharp teeth.

Her body language screams aggression. No onlooker would be dense enough to miss it. It’s the markers of an Alpha on the brink of a feral break. Lela’s displaying all the markers that’d get an Alpha locked up on any given day.

The doctor, kind and patient as she had been when she first arrived, spots it in an instance. Her hazel eyes going wide in fear soaked surprise. But she doesn’t budge. She holds her ground too even if her shoulders shake and her fear is tangible in her scent.

“I’m not a fucking _omega_ ,” Lela spits out the word like it burns her damn mouth to hold. Which, in all honesty, isn’t so far off the marker.

Dark lips go white with how tight they are pinched into a line as Dr. Kahanna issues a clipped, “ _Fine_. If you insist on refusing treatment, I won’t force you to stay.”

Freedom, so close Lela can almost taste it, lies just outside of the door. But the doctor doesn’t move. She stays rooted in her spot. Her eyes far from having let the issue drop.

“But, I will tell you this,” Dr. Kahanna continues on, crossing her arms over her chest as she raised her own head in a small version of a challenge, “if you _were_ an Omega, you should know, that this trauma has left you horribly scarred. The chances of you ever successfully carrying a pregnancy to term has significantly dropped. If you do not look after yourself, if you continue to use back alley suppressants and blockers, you’ll likely sterilize yourself before the year is out.”

Gritting her teeth, Lela curls her lip in disgust and grips her jacket tight before shoving her arms through the sleeves. The words aren’t exactly the great big threat the good doctor thinks they are. Lela cannot dream of a worst nightmare for herself than to be pumped and bred like some broodmare. She knows it’s what people want Omega’s for. For their weeklong heats. For their pliable scent. For their fertility.

Lela knows, fears it every day she wakes. That someone’s going to get close enough, that her suppressors are going to somehow fail her or that she’s going to grow sloppy, and someone will catch her. That they’ll force her into another bond, put the bite on her and claim her like a thing. A thing to fuck and use, to pump full of semen until kids just start walking out of her fully formed.

It’s a fucking nightmare that hangs above Lela’s head like a shining blade of the guillotine.

Lela can not think of a sweeter relief than to find herself sterile and barren. To know that she’ll be useless in that department. Because what Alpha would want her if half her reason for existing just didn’t work?

“Go fuck yourself,” Lela hisses out.

Rage bubbles hot and wild beneath her skin. Prickling like molten hot needles aching to spill out lava from her heated veins. The soft state the drugs had put her in is firmly being crushed beneath the heel of her temper.

“I don’t wish to offend you or…” Dr. Kahanna starts only to trail off as Lela snatched her bag off the bed and pushed past her.

“Wait!” the doctor half screams. Her brown hands reaching out to yank Lela into place.

Snarling, Lela pushes the doctor off and away from herself. Adrenaline lends itself to strength Lela didn’t think she had. She whirls around in her rage and slams the good doctor up against the wall. Her teeth, sharp and dangerous are bared perilously close to the doctors face. One wrong move and Lela knows they’ll shred whatever piece of meat they happen to close over.

“Please,” Dr. Kahanna starts, her voice pitched low and placating. The scents she’s pumping out are half soothing but still ring sour with her fear. Yet, the doctor meets her eyes steadily enough as she continued on, “At least let me give you some proper suppressants before you leave. If you leave in the condition you’re in…your scent—”

a savage growl spills from Lela’s stretched lips as she roughly pushes away from the doctor. Fear makes her heart race, makes her mind jumble up and scramble. She knows where the sentence she’d cut off was going. She knows that her scent must be clearing up. She’s spent the last couple of days with fluids running through her body. It’s flushed out most of the acidic of the black market suppressors she’d been on.

Lela knows if she were to step out into the open, any passerby who leaned in close enough would be able to make out the truth she’s so desperate to hide. She knows this just as much as the doctor does.

But she also knows, if she accepts the doctors help she’s admitting what she is. That she’s that fucking dreaded dynamic. That she’s the lesser of the whole. That she’s an unclaimed, dirty, broken and used Omega. That she’s something to be looked after, cared for, a thing to lock away and use when someone so wished. She’d be admitting it if she took anything from the doctor.

As tempting as the offer is, Lela isn’t that stupid.

All doctors are law bound to report Omega’s and Lela would be damned if all her hard work would go up in smoke because of it.

“Fuck off,” Lela growled out before making her escape.

As Lela pushes past the threshold, the clock over the bathroom marks ten minutes. Glancing both ways, Lela spots an elevator and makes her way towards it. There’s a couple of nurses moving about, dressed in at least three different sets of scrubs. A soft lilac hue, deep burgundy red and chestnut brown. They barely glance her way as she flees.

Which is good. Lela’s heart is running a mile a minute. She can feel it beating a ragged beat against her still sore and tender ribs. Every quick stomp she takes sends spikes of pain throughout her body. The pain in her pussy is making her want to vomit with every jarring motion. Thankfully, Lela’s got an empty stomach. If she pukes, it’ll be nothing but stomach acid at this point.

The elevator is luckily empty when she walks in. The silver doors slide shut with barely a sound. Smacking the L button Lela leans back against the railing and forces her heart to slow. In total, the elevator ride isn’t all that long. It goes straight down.

But Lela’s in a wild panic. Everything the suppressors had washed away in sepia are becoming sharp edged. She can smell just about everyone that’s been in the goddamn elevator since it’s installation. She can smell, Alpha’s, Beta’s and Gamma’s. She can smell them and they make her want to cry out.

Biting her tongue until she can taste blood, Lela leans her clammy forehead back against the cool metal of the elevator. She wills her panic away with a growl and bitter frustration. Lela knows it’s dangerous to be so wildly out of control of her emotions and scent. She knows if she keeps it up, she won’t make it past the guards in the lobby.

When the doors ping open, she forces herself up and almost crashes into the waiting figures before her. Catching herself, she glances upward and takes in the startled expressions of two model worthy strangers. Beautiful as their faces might be, that isn’t what renders her shock still.

No, it’s their scents.

The first to assault her is the red heads. She smells like ginger bread and something spicy and wildly unnamable. There’s something there, just harsh enough—like gun smoke—to suggest the woman herself was a fury—was a Beta. It makes her hindbrain slither.

The second comes crashing into her like a tidal wave. The dirty blonde man smells of both black licorice and strawberry bubble gum. The two scents warring against one another to be known first. Lost between those two scents is the distinct tang of salt water. It’s a strangeness all wrapped up in a Gamma whirl.

Locked in place, Lela stares up at them two. Her hindbrain—her measly fucking dynamic—wants her to drop to her fucking knees before them. Her worthlessly dynamic cries out for those scents—so heavenly divine—to wrap her in something warm and soft and leech from her the pain of this world.

A cry builds up in her throat, reedy and desperate. But Lela crushes it down with unforgiving hatred. Biting down on her tongue, drinking back her blood, Lela shoulders past the quiet pair and continues on her way.

The guards in the lobby don’t even glance her way. Which is good, she’s not ready to do a repeat performance. Though, this time around, she’d like to sink her teeth into that fucker that knocked her flat. Her eyes flash over the faces but come up empty.

Somewhere, someone, finally gives Lela a break. Because the moment she steps past the front doors, Lela is doused in a rain fall the likes of which could raise Noah’s ark. A half delirious laugh bubbles in her chest as she practically sprints towards the nearest pharmacy.

She finds one four or so blocks down from Pepper’s building. She flies in and snatches the first bottle of rubbing alcohol on the shelf. She loads four more into her bag before sealing herself in the restroom. Gracelessly, Lela upends the entirety of the bottle over her head.

It burns when the liquid rushes down to the stitches on her neck and continues down. By the time the bottles empty, Her hair is soaked and clinging to her skin. Roughly finger combing the strands back Lela tosses the bottle into the trash and pops another open and continues to douse herself. Lela’s halfway through the second bottle when someone starts knocking on the door.

Gritting her teeth, Lela stashes the bottle back into her bag and steels herself for the trip back to her motel room. The alcohol will cover what the rain won’t drown out. It’ll keep her safe until she can shot herself full of poison.

Shouldering her way past a disgruntled employee, Lela flies out of the pharmacy like a bat out of hell. She ignores the cries at her back and sprints down the street. Every injury she’s got is screaming in protest. But Lela bites down harshly on her cheeks until she can taste blood. Right now, she doesn’t have the luxury of taking anything slow.

She needs to get back. She needs to get her shit back in order.

It’s only when she’s in the safety of her motel room that guilt wriggles—wicked and twisted—at the back of her mind. She can’t help but wonder if maybe she should’ve stuck around long enough to thank Pepper or something. She’d promised Dr. Banner ten minutes. She wonders if maybe she would’ve accepted their help if Pepper had been their with her pretty sky blue eyes. Lela wonders, wonders if maybe she should’ve taken the help from Dr. Kahanna anyway. She wonders if that old lady would've snatched that golden opportunity with both hands. Lela wonders what that old lady would think of Lela and all her bullshit cowardly moves. 

She wonders...wonders...and wonders...

But she stuffs those thoughts down until they suffocate with the rest of the shit Lela won’t touch.

Needle in hand, Lela mixes a vial of suppressants and lines her veins with it. It burns going in after so long of not using. When it does little to dull her senses, as it should, she forces some black sugar to chase it. And that’s when all the thoughts of Pepper and Dr. Banner just slip and tumble straight out of her head to be dealt with on a different day, week, month, year.

 

* * *

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Life is a cruel hellish beast.  
> But here's to hoping I can keep posting!  
> -Ani


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